


A Carol of Final Chances

by misreall



Series: Physics is like sex: sure, it may give some practical results, but that's not why we do it. [3]
Category: Loki: Agent of Asgard, Marvel Cinematic Universe, Norse Religion & Lore
Genre: Anal Play, Anal Sex, Christmas, Christmas Smut, F/M, First Kiss, Incubus Loki, Light Bondage, Light Dom/sub, Loki AU, Multi, Neck Kissing, Oral Sex, Romance, Rough Kissing, Rough Sex, Semi-Public Sex, Sex, Sex Toys, Surprise Kissing, Threesome - F/M/M, Vaginal Sex, angel loki
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-15
Updated: 2019-01-18
Packaged: 2019-09-19 14:41:10
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 22,706
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17003592
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/misreall/pseuds/misreall
Summary: Nora has a angel problem to go with her demon infestation.





	1. Chapter 1

“Um…”  

Nora looked at the demon on her porch and the angel floating in her front yard.  

Each perfect feature of their faces and bodies seemed to be identical, other than the areas where they were exactly opposite.  

It could be a hallucination, she thought, brought on by stress and exhaustion.  I haven’t really been sleeping well on Jennie’s couch. 

She felt something tickling her leg above her ankle boots.  The cat was twining between her feet, clearly looking for food.  It put a paw on her black tights, making an annoyed  _ blerping _ noise. 

That was clearly real.

She looked back at the demon, who was lounging on her porch, eyefucking her, then at the angel, the tips of whose wings were gently sweeping back and forth, still making the ice hanging from the trees and bushes chime like harp song, his impassive gaze never leaving her face.

“Sorry, I got distracted,” she told the cat.  

Looking at the demon and the angel in turn, “I guess you can come inside if you don’t set anything on fire OR knock anything over with those birdy bits. But first, get the rest of the stuff from my car.  The cat’s hungry and I’m too tired.”

Closing, but not locking the door behind her, Nora went to the kitchen to see if she still had any viable coffee, not thinking about who were outside of her house and if they were coming in.  Carefully measuring enough grounds for a full carafe, while letting the cold water run since the pipes were old and hadn’t been used in a while, she didn’t think about anything but getting that first cup.  

There was an opening and closing of her door, with a lot of jostling noises and two deep, resonant male voices - one clear and annoyed, the other husky and amused - sniping at each other in a language Nora only vaguely recognised.

“Enochian,” she thought.  “I have native Enochian speakers in my foyer.”  That was weird. She poured the water into the machine and turned it on, watching the red light.  It was sort of festive. She was going to have to get her Christmas decorations out of the basement soon, if she wanted to get them up in time.  

“I’m out of sugar,” she said out loud, her voice rather shaky.  So were her hands, she had spilled a lot of coffee and water. Holding them up, they were wavering like leaves during a thunderstorm.  The smell of the coffee, normally so comforting, was making her a little sick. And her skin was wet with sweat but she was freezing. Since her house had nice, new, snug windows and the heat was working it was quite warm. 

“I’m out of sugar and I might be in shock,” she nodded to herself.  And then nodded again, because it felt like she wasn’t nodding but someone else was.  Making her then feel like running away. “Definitely shock. Oh, yeah, shock, shocky shock.  I’m not doing too well, are we?”

She started to laugh.

Then the edges of her vision went black and wonky.  

“Shit, I am going to faint.  And I have guests,” she said.  Then giggled, and lay down on the old, scarred linoleum - that really needed to be mopped - before she could take a header.  “How fucking embarrassing…” she slurred out as the darkness flooded in the rest of the way, a distant sound of distressed voices singing her into unconsciousness.

 

Nora felt perfectly comfortable for the first time in longer than she could remember.  She was entirely warm and cozy, and someone was softly petting her hair.

Then she started to wake up.

“Nope,” she said, rolling over, refusing to be awake for some reason.  There was something she really didn’t want to face.

Which was ironic, she thought later, since rolling over gave her a faceful of Loki’s cock, which was the source of most of her problems.  Granted, it was more or less contained by his leggings and a straining leather thong, but there it was, blatantly outlined in black suede, throbbing softly when her lips and nose brushed against it.

“I think she’s awake,” Loki said, his voice dark as smoke, one of his long hands still stroking her hair, but now in a more suggestive way, as if thinking about what else he might like to be stroking.  

They weren’t speaking English, Latin, or Irish, but Nora could still understand them.

“Awake and no doubt traumatised by your… your-”  same voice, but with a tone of tapped crystal. 

“Penis?  Knob? Wang?  Meat sword? Tallywacker?  Dick, schlong, pizzle, or junk?  Skin flute? Phallus, or cock, or fuck stick?  Johnson, perhaps? How about ‘generating tool’?  The Puritans used that one, so it should be right up your alley.  And frankly, you could use something up your alley, Gelusael. So tense…..”

“You are disgusting.”

“But not wrong.”

Pushing herself up, she found she had been laying on her couch, wrapped in one of the endless numbers of afghans her grandmother Elizabeth had made, using her not very strong magic to cause them to never get dirty or worn, her head in one Loki’s lap while the other one sat on her coffee-table where he had spread a napkin to keep from actually touching it, was looking concerned. 

She hastily pulled away and slid to the other end of the couch, suddenly much colder, but with a clearer mind.

The cat noticed she was awake and immediately started lobbying for food in a high, querulous series of cries that made her sound pitiful and righteous at the same time.  The Loki on the table raised an aristocratic eyebrow at the cat as if unsure what it was but he was not in favor.

That was Gelusael.  The angelic version of her demon problem.  It would probably be easier to think of him that way.  

Assuming she couldn’t get them both to leave so she could try to never think of either of them again.

But first things first.  “What happened to your wings?”  

He looked at her, blank-faced.  Then they gently spread outwards from seemingly nowhere on his back, his black suit jacket not losing its perfect fit.  Then, they slowly retreated and disappeared. 

“I would still have a full set of teacups and couple of vases I liked if you could have done that before.”

“I could always do that.  _  He _ , however…” he said, motioning to the demon with a roll of his eyes, “incompetent.”  

“Yeah, well, _ he _ was  _ we  _ back then, Gel,” Loki said, leaning back and spreading his knees, “just to refresh your memory.”

The cat got louder and started pawing at Nora’s afghan, that she was clutching tightly around her shoulders.  

“Let me take care of your pussy, and then we can chat,” Loki said, standing up and walking to the kitchening, making kissing sounds as the cat followed him.  His horns and hair were no longer smoldering, but the room grew noticeably cooler as he left.

Nora could feel her eyes wide and staring at the angel, who stared back at her, his face still expressionless.  “Um...I’m Nora,” she said, putting out her hand.

“Pretiositatem, we have met.  Rather, um,” he put a long finger beneath his shirt collar as if trying to loosen it a bit, “rather more than met.”  Still expressionless, he seemed unable to meet her eyes.

“What he means, precious,” Loki purred from the kitchen doorway, “is that he is me, and I am he, and that when I was experiencing the  _ nonpareil _ delights of your exquisite cunt and all of the rest of you,” she could feel the heat of his eyes roaming over her body, “we were one and the same.  That spell of yours was fuckered. In a way even I couldn’t enjoy.”

“Again, disgusting but correct,” the angel now looked at her, his eyes full of shame and something else.  

Nora sat back on the couch.  “Huh. Is that coffee ready yet?”

 

_ In England, near dawn _ …

Thomas rolled over, feeling the sun about to rise, knowing he had to get up and start the winter ritual that would culminate on the Solstice and would ensure the return of his powers for another year, but his bed was comfortable and Maura was warm and smelled of sleep and sex. 

Instead of doing what he should do, for the first time in his unnaturally long life he ignored the discipline and instead spooned his lover,  _ his fiancee  _ he thought with pleased amusement, pulling one of her legs back over his hip so he could gently stroke her awake.  Unless he could reason out a way to share the power of his yearly rejuvenation with Maura, he wasn’t certain he wanted to continue as he had.

_ Would it be so bad _ , he thought as he groaned and sunk his cock deep into her already wet and ready center, making her sigh in return, would it be so bad to age?   _ To have children with this woman, and grow old with her?  _

As she sleepily took him, undulating under his stroking fingers, pulling him deeper and deeper as he whispered the filth she loved into her ear, licking the circle of it as he praised her for her tightness, her heat, her need.  

When they came, she screamed herself the rest of the way awake.

Afterwards, blushing a bit as they both got up to start the day, Maura saw her mobile flashing that she had a text.  She held the phone up to show him. It was from Nora.

Loki was back.  

In force.

Thomas sighed.  

Of course he was.

 

_ Midnight in Chicago _ ....

Nora sat at her kitchen table with the demon, the angel, and the cat who, having not been able to figure out which of the two males was the one who had rescued her in the first place, had decided to lay in the middle of the tabletop, seemingly asleep other than the flicking tip of her tail.  

It occurred to Nora that she shouldn’t let the cat up there, that it was setting a bad precedent.  But then, she thought, fuck it. I’ve got way bigger problems.

The demon had drunk most of the first pot of coffee before Nora had even gotten to the kitchen, her legs still unsteady.  The angel had followed her, fluttering lightly about her -  _ ha, fluttering, wings, funny,  _ part of her thought - fluttering about her in concern but clearly unwilling to touch her.

While the second pot brewed she refused to talk to either of them.  She needed at least two cups. Her stomach turned, sour with hunger, but she had nothing in the house.  The sound of the pouring coffee was soothing. 

“You usually take cream,” the angel noted.

“Everything in the fridge is a science experiment at this point,” she winced at the heat of the coffee but drank anyway.

Standing and stalking over to the icebox on his long, long legs, his shoes clicking neatly, Gelusael opened it and made a gesture.  The room briefly smelled of water, incense, and nutmeg. He picked out a carton of half and half and carefully added some to her cup.  

It was as fresh as the day she bought it.  Fresher, maybe.

“Showoff,” the demon said, producing a flask from somewhere.  He waggled it at Nora, who shook her head, but then nodded yes.  

It wasn’t whiskey, and she almost choked.  “Aqua regia,” he said, reaching out to do something to help her.

Gelusael, quicker than any snake, grabbed his hand and slammed it onto the table.  “No touching. Not unless it’s strictly required.”

Loki fell back against the back of the chair, a filthy smile, “Well you know that’s just not going to happen.  Keeping my hands to myself is hard enough, without the impossible provocation of the woman I love to tempt me.”

Now Nora did choke, but they didn’t notice, too intent on staring holes into each other.

“Umm…” she said.

“You are incapable of love, demon.  I love her, you are merely obsessed.”

Loki shrugged, sipping straight from the flask this time. “But what a glorious, all-consuming obsession.  And unlike you, I can at least do something about my  _ feelings _ .”  He said the last word as if it were about to make him vomit and then, as if sensing something, half-stood to look down at the angel’s lap.  

Gelusael crossed his legs, turning slightly.

Loki raised a brow, “Hmmm… that’s different.  We didn’t have one of those the last time we were one of the HH.”  He turned to Nora, who was gawping at them both, “Heavenly host, treasure.  It seems that my fine, feathered twin has finally turned into a real, live boy with a real, live tonsil tickler.  You are an impressive witch. First we broke out in wings because of you, and now the angel grew an anaconda, from the looks of it.  Should we order Thai?”

“It’s too late,” she answered woodenly.  This was all still too much.

“I know a guy.  He’ll get up and make plate of miang kham for me that will make you swoon,” he said, tapping away on his phone.  “Tell her the rest of it. Herman! L ūk s̄unạk̄h tạw pord k̄hxng c̄hạn pĕn xỳāngrị? Ks̄ʹạtriy̒ k̄hxng khuṇ mī rāchinī xyū̀ nı k̄hṇa nī̂ læa ṭhex t̂xng dị̂ rạb xāh̄ār…” he got up as he spoke and walked into the living room, leaving a scent of fire, Uberlube, and cardamom in his wake.

“Tell me what?”  Nora could tell her voice was high and almost squeaking.  She needed to go to sleep, but bad. 

Then again, she could eat, too.

Gelusael leaned over his cup of coffee, not drinking but clearly enjoying the warmth of it.  He needed it. She could feel the cold coming off of his body. “He would leave me the dirty work.  I should say the hard wor-, I mean, GODDAMN it!”

“Are you allowed to say that?”  Nora was mildly scandalized.

He ignored that, “We came to you - why does everything sound sexual now? We came to you because we cannot go on like this.  We are meant to be one being, for good or ill, and the spell we enacted with you,” he blushed and stopped. 

Standing, straightening his tie, he continued in the manner of a professor.  “The spell caused this effect. Perhaps because falling in love with a mortal, with anything, is impossible for a demon, and in certain sense for angel as well.  It caused a splitting of our nature. A splitting that cannot be sustained.”

“Food will be here in an hour.  I may have to do a thing with Herman.  Don’t worry, it won’t take long. He never does, poor guy.  Anyway, did you tell her that she has to pick yet?”

“Pick?”  Nora said, a fresh, shiny new dread rising in her heart.

“I had not gotten that far ye-”

Loki cut him off, “Pick one of us.  There isn’t enough juice, power, mana, call it what you will, to sustain both of us for more than a few more weeks, if that.  Either one of us gets to go on, or we are both _ phffitt _ \- gone into the aether and then nothingness.”

“And as the only thing we can both agree on is you,” the angel cut in, with an annoyed huff, “we have decided to leave it to you, our lovely witch, to pick.  Who can live-”

“And who can bugger off for eternity into the nothingness,” Loki concluded.

They both sat back down and stared at her.

Nora proffered her cup to Loki, who poured her a larger slug.  This time she drank it without as much as a cough.

 


	2. You Have a Big Problem.  Here, We Wrapped It Up and Put It Under the Tree.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nora had breakfast with her house-guests.

Nora sat up stretching, feeling nearly rested for the first time in weeks.  Maybe months. 

That aqua regia was good stuff. Weird that she didn’t have a hangover.   

She also realized that her bed wasn’t listing slightly to the front or shifting precariously on the stack of books she was using in place of the broken leg.  And that the sheets were fresh, also smelling faintly of lilies of the valley and incense - not a combination she’d smelled before but it was quite beautiful.  

They weren’t any sheets she recognized, nor the piles of fluffy pillows, all trimmed with gauzy flounces.

Stretching more and confused, she noticed something else.

Not only was her hair brushed and laying over her shoulders, perfect and gleaming like satin, but she was dressed in a long white nightgown made of the softest cotton, trimmed in swaths of silken lace, with a very high, buttoned neckline.  It was made of acres and acres of material. It was like a highly romantic snuggy.

All she needed was a candelabra and a gloomy manor house to be fleeing from across the moors in the middle of the night and she’d be good to go.  As it was, she was just about ready to flee her own bedroom in a panic, since when she gone to bed everything - including her - had been in a far less pretty and virginal state, and she’d been wearing a pair of sweats and an old Red Elvises t-shirt for their ‘Drinking with Jesus’ tour.  

“What the actual fuck?” she asked herself and the cat, who was sitting on the window next to the bed, watching something outside, paying Nora no attention.

“I know.  Gel’s taste in fabric is impeccable, but as a modeste he leaves much to be desired.  And _ everything _ to the imagination.”

In keeping with her ridiculous nightie, Nora shrieked and grabbed her blankets, which were now deep green velvet and also bedecked in lace, and held them up to her chin like a spinster in an old Hollywood movie.

Loki the demon lounged naked across the foot of her bed.  Which, in addition to no longer being sex lamed and precarious, was now king sized and barely fit in the room, which was how she had missed him being there in the first place.  Although the rich, heady scent rolling off his hot skin should have been a giveaway.

Everything in her place smelled good lately.  Normally it was all cold coffee, herbs, and the black mold that was worryingly growing in the basement.

He too stretched and rolled over onto his hands and knees.  With a flash of his smoldering horns and wicked look he crawled up the length of the bed and then her blanketed body, so he bracketed her with his arms and legs.  “Now there is a sound I want to hear more of, that excited shriek. But with less terror and more begging…” 

His voice was a low, husky purr and he moved like a sleepy panther. 

A wave of heat and woodsmoke scented air enveloped her.  It was voluptuous, as if she were being stroked everywhere that it touched, and a few places it couldn’t possibly be.  Between her legs she was aching and soaked already, softly pulsing like an anxious heart. As if that part of her was beckoning him rather than the other way around. 

There was a soft, wonderful vibration coming from him.

_ Oh, god _ , she thought, _ he actually is purring… I may die this time _ .

“Not,” he added, stopping and cocking his head from one side to the other, smiling slowly, “that I mind, you understand.  Just the idea of debauching you in that pristine, vestal get up makes me so hard my cock is ready to split. It’s harder than my other horns, and you know just how hard they are, do you not, my dirty pet?  Between these weeks without you and the idea of how filthy that wet, pink cunt of yours is going to look under that immaculate tent you are shrouded in when I finish fingering you. When I make it gush all over that virgin’s shroud...”

Unwittingly, Nora felt her body sliding back down onto her back, so his lips were just above hers, she was wondering if this was a good idea.  

Not because she planned on not doing it, but more for curiosity's sake.  “Nora...” his eyes were the purest black, and his breath scalded her lips and made her open them.  

Expecting to be burned and ravished, Nora was instead seduced and cajoled by the lightest, softest kiss, his lips brushing over hers, his tongue barely teasing the tip of hers, so she followed his retreat, sitting up to pursue his mouth.  Long fingers toyed with her breast, pinching and twisting her nipple to the point of pain while he tenderly sucked on her tongue and stroked her hair back from her cheek.

Moaning, nearly whimpering, she fell back and he smirked down at her, his mouth now in a cruel twist, but his eyes avid and as needy as hers.

Just as he had pushed the blankets to the side and was sitting back on his heels so he could watch himself raise the hem of her gown, the door to her room slammed open and Loki was wrenched off her body.  “Enough!” Gelusael shouted, holding the demon up by one of his horns, his wings furled and tense, his pale face furious. “You swore-”

Loki dangled, his feet an inch off of the ground, his arms crossed, “I lied.  Clearly.”

“Put him down!” Nora ordered.

“But, my lady, he and I had an agreement-,” the angel’s high cheeks were pinked and he seemed to be trying to look everywhere but at Nora.  She couldn’t figure out why, since she hadn’t been more dressed since her snowsuit days ended at six when she looked down.

Even through the miles of fabric her nipples were very, very there.  

“You and he had an agreement about me, but since I wasn’t involved it’s null and fucking void.”

He blushed harder.

Now Nora crossed her arms and chanted, “Fuck, shit, come, piss, motherfucker, cocksucker, cunt, asshole, ass, taint, jackoff, douche, I can go on, son of a bitch, bastard, cumstain, prolapse, twatwaffle, smegbreath, damn, suck, cock, dick, pussy, stop me any time, anal fis-”

“STOP!”  Gelusael raised a hand to halt her, dropping Loki neatly to his feet at the same moment.

“Thanks, treasure, now where-”

“Nope.”

“Nope?”

“Nope.  One of you go make breakfast and the other just go.  I expect everyone to be dressed and downstairs in twenty minutes, we need to talk.”

Loki leered at her, “Ooooh, I love it when you’re all authoritative, lamb.”

Gelusael rolled his eyes and, using his wings and hands, swept his smutty twin from the room.

 

Nora had refused to let either of them speak until she had eaten breakfast.  They sat as they had the night before - minus the cat in the middle of the table - with the angel on her right and the demon on her left.  They had eaten as well. 

Loki had had _ pain perdu _ with cane sugar syrup, a pot of black coffee, and a tumbler of Bloody Mary that seemed to be most of a bottle of Crystal hot sauce, half a bottle of vodka, and had had a can of tomato juice waved over it.  Thankfully, he had chosen to dress before eating. He wore a pair of black jeans that showed his amazing thighs to good effect, and a green silk shirt that hung open and set off the red fire of his eyes.

He needed to shave.  She wanted to scratch her face with his stubble.

Gelusael had picked at some fresh fruit, an egg white omelet with spinach and feta cheese and, surprisingly, a salted caramel milkshake with a shot of espresso.  He wore an exquisitely tailored suit, the jacket of which was off, but he still wore the tie and vest, though he had neatly rolled up his sleeves.

His long fingers delicately held his fork, and she thought how nicely they would fit laced with hers.  

Then she shook it off and ate.

Nora had so much food put in front of her she couldn’t keep track.  Finally, after a plate of beignets, she fell back into her chair with a moan, sipping coffee.

“What a deliciously post coital noise that was…” 

“Shut.  Up.” Gelusael did not bother to look up from his meal.

“Stop it.  I’m no longer too tired and hungry to think.  So here’s the deal. No.”

Nora sipped more coffee as the Annoyance Twins exchanged a look and then they turned towards her.  

“What do you mean-” one of them started.

“-by ‘No.’?” The other finished.

“I mean thank you for the work on my house.  I love the new bed, even though if I ever move it won’t make it out of my bedroom.  And the Christmas decorations in the living room, even if it does look like Dickens and Martha Stewart mutually masturbated all over the place,” she mused, while nodding at Gelusael, who blushed and looked uncomfortable.

It was hard not to reach over and take his hand, although she was afraid he would pull away if she did.

“And for all of the food.  Really, this was kind of too much even for me.  The snickerdoodle coffee cake and the brie and bacon hash browns… I will never get over them,” she said to Loki, who bit his lower lip and watched her mouth as she spoke, giving her chills.

“But no.  I’m not going to decide between you.  I refuse. Don’t have it in me to condemn someone to… To anything, really.”

“Other than oblivion.  Which will be one of our fates if you refuse, my darling one,” Gelusael said, taking her hand between his cool ones, answering that question.

He stared into her eyes.  “Please. Even if it should be… him,” he shuddered in disgust, “then at least some part of me will remain in existence.  My features, my memories. Choose him if you must, but choose.”

Loki reached out, taking her free hand and raising it to his lips, “He’s right,” he said around nibbling her knuckles, “it really should be me...”

“Ugghghgh!”  Disgusted, Nora ripped her hands away from both of them.  She stood and paced, “Listen, you both claim to have feelings for me.  You love me, you’re obsessed with me, like the man said, it’s complicated!”

Loki chuckled, Gelusael leaned forward, his features solemn.  

“Well, I don’t believe the first thing, and the second thing has turned out to suck for me pretty hard, and now you are doing this to me.  I’m really starting hate you, and I’m pretty damned sure you have to hate me, because if this is love, you can keep it!”

In a blink or less they were both on their feet, “Please don’t say that,” one shouted and the other whispered.

Gelusael put a hand up to stop Loki from talking further, which rather amazingly actually worked.  “ _ Mea femina _ , would you allow us a moment in private to discuss matters?”

“Sure,” she sat back down and poured another cup of coffee, gesturing to the backdoor, “enjoy the backyard.  Maybe you can shovel while you’re out there.”

 

It was about 17 degrees outside. 

Angels don’t get cold, nor do demons.

Gelusael snapped his fingers and the walkway to the alley was completely cleared.

Loki snorted, “Suck up.”

“We owe her.”

“I plan on making everything up to her, one screaming orgasm at a time,” Loki smirked, “but please, keep up the housework.  It’ll give my lovely witch more free time and energy. She’ll need both.”

Gelusael snapped his fingers again and a sheet of snow slid off of the roof, striking his demon brother in the face.

“Very mature.”

“I have an idea.”

 

Nora watched from the kitchen window.  After what seemed to be a little squabbling the angel, his wings folded away, seemed to be making a point about something.  At first the demon frowned, but then a - naturally - dirty smile spread across his face, and he threw his head back and laughed nodding.

She swore she could feel it. 

Then, he put out a hand.

The angel reared back a bit, then with a look of stoic distaste, took it in his, giving one firm shake.

Then, as if the universe needed to make commentary, there was a crack of thunder and the skies began to snow down in thick, wet waves of flakes.

Nora nodded too.

If they were agreeing something had to be wrong.

In a moment, both perfectly dry, they came back into the kitchen.  “We have decided that it is unfair to expect you to decide-”

Nora interrupted the angel, “You didn’t decide that. It just is unfair-”

“But we also do have these… feelings… for you, however confused we all three may find them-”

“Babe, you ain’t kiddin’-”

He spoke a little louder and faster to try and beat her comments, “So we have decided that if you will allow we will spend these last weeks we have of existence with you.”

“What?”  Now Nora was confused.  These two could go anywhere, have anything.  The separation may have been killing them, but it seemed to have fixed their power problem.  “Why?”

“Because we have nowhere else we would rather be,” Loki said, blowing on his fingernails so they changed from black to deep purple. 

“Um…” Nora’s chest ached.  She wanted to say no, to kick them out and let her heart start to heal but she couldn’t.  No matter how bad they were for her, she loved them. The coldly kind angel and the wildly carnal and chaotic demon, and she missed the creature they had been, even if none of them deserved her.

And that trying to sort them out was giving her a headache.

If she kept them here maybe she would finally figure out a way to unfuck them  _ and  _ her heart.  

“Ok,” she said in a small, rather sad voice.  Then she straightened up, determined that this go around would be different.  “Three rules. You two do all of the housework and cooking. And we have to come to an agreement on the redecorating.  My bedroom looks like something a Disney Princess would think was too fucking princess-y. Rule two, no physical fighting between the two of you, my house won’t survive it.  And,” she felt pretty clever about this one, hoping it would curtail what would be the demon’s relentless and surely successful attempts to bed her, “rule three, anything I do with one of you, I have to do with the other one, too.  We make equal time, boys, or we make no time at all.”

“Hey!” Loki started to object, but before he could speak, his brother smiled.  

“That seems fair, which means I am due.”

Gelusael stepped close to Nora, taking her space, her air.  His wings extended, blocking Loki’s view, and he laid a hand on her neck, pulling her to him, bending down.  

His mouth was cold and tentative, and he groaned against her lips.  Her body trembled with the pressure of his presence, so different from his twin but just as strong.  He touched her, kissed her, as if she were something sacred, something he might worship and perhaps defile.  He was hungry and she knew he didn’t understand how to devour her. 

But he wanted to.

His mouth left hers, reluctant and open, his eyes half closed and his features so open and longing.  “Thank you…” he said, the hand on her throat gently tracing upwards to cup her cheek, to touch his fingertips to her eyelashes, to stroke down her nose, as if overcome and suddenly unable to not touch her.  

Nora put a hand to his chest, “Was that your first kiss?  I mean as an angel?”

His pale green eyes seemed darker just before they closed the rest of the way, “Yes…”

Stepping back, his face flushed, his wings whipped back down and he half bowed to her, “I’ll go do the laundry.”

Nora’s heart fluttered, and she felt a little faint.  She met Loki’s eyes, and for once he was slack-jawed and silent.

He had just started to speak when there was a rapid knocking on her door.

Maura and Thomas were both soaked, determined and tired looking, and had enough luggage for a long stay.

Loki rushed past Nora to open the door, “Just what every party needs!  More sinners….”

  
  
  
  



	3. I Like to be Fair.  I Split My Time Equally Between Trouble and Mayhem

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nora has too many roommates.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, is this a long chapter....

Nora stood next to the beautiful, brilliantly lit Christmas tree, hung with both her and Claire’s old ornaments, as well as green and gold balls, red garland, and an endless number of lights.  Her arms were crossed and she was staring at the demon with a raised eyebrow.

“I’m not going to fuck you just so you can make  _ yourself _ jealous.”

She added a little verbal english to the one word to emphasize the truth that both Loki and Gelusael hated to talk about. 

Loki cocked his head, his crimson eyes gleaming, a surprisingly soft smile showing a flash of his fangs which were longer and sharper now that there was no angel left in him.  “Not to make  _ him _ jealous, precious,” he said, causing the truth to spin away from him.  “He’s already so sick with jealousy it drips off of him. Really, the cat has been licking it off of the floor.”

He put down the whiskey and gin cocktail he’d been sipping and sauntered to her.  

Yeah, it was only three steps, but he still managed to saunter, she thought, hating that she was also a little breathless at the swagger of his lean hips and the set of his shoulders.  He put a taloned hand to her shoulder so those long, ebony nails could gently scratch along her clavicle, and leaned in to whisper, “I want to fuck you so he has to fuck you too. He was the one who made the rules, and the thought that he is going to dissolve into oblivion without dipping that celestial meat javelin of his into the terrestrial perfection of your hungry gash…”

Nora had always hated the term ‘gash’ but having Loki’s poisonous sigh trace around her ear made her nipples harden and pinch and her gash prickle and soften.  Without especially wanting to, she laid a hand on his chest, the silk of his shirt feeling like it was about to burst into flames as the skin underneath it grew hotter and hotter.  She turned her head and tilted it up, so she spoke close to his lips, close enough that the words made them just barely brush so every inch of her tingled and his hand tightened around her shoulder.

“While you watch?” she asked, her voice husky.  

He nodded, the motion making her mouth drag open just a touch, and she couldn’t help but lick out just a bit with her tongue.

“Yeah, never,” she said, snapping her head back and pulling away.  

Loki leaned back on the credenza that had not been in her living room before the latest round of remodeling - they were on the third in as many days - and smirked at her.  “Well, we can skip me watching, if we must. Although, really, you owe it to yourself to have me as a … third base coach if you will. Because he’s clearly not going to know how to get you home on his own.  That said, he’ll probably pop off as soon as he even sees that your knickers are wet, and then, knowing how badly he responds to coming, and how disgusted he would be at doing it in his pants, he’ll probably run away to the Atlas mountains or something and we can fuck out my last days of existence in peace.”

“And you don’t respond that way to me bringing you off?”  Nora reached under the back of her blouse to hook her bra, which had spontaneously come undone when he leaned into her.  “‘Cause you were just you and not the both of you back when th-”

“Oh, try me, treasure,” he said, eyes slitted, now more predatory than seductive.  

Nora gulped.

“I think that is only fair.  If the sex demon is so desperate to get laid that he is using my possible needs to seduce you, then if you are so inclined please have mercy on him,  _ laetitia _ .  And then  _ punish _ me with my share of your delights.”

Gelusael’s cool, stern voice matched his expression where he stood in the door, white shirted arms crossed, his tie perfectly straight, his eyes thin with anger.  

“It really pisses me off that I can’t tell if you are serious about it being a punishment or not.  The two of you have already torn my ego and my life to shreds, so I really don’t think I can take much more,” Nora decided to leave the living room to the two of them, so they could continue what had been endless sniping since they had settled into her house.

Again.

Before she could leave, the angel dodged before her, a look of confusion on his face, “I don’t know.”

“What?”

Loki answered for him, “He doesn’t know.  He doesn’t know if he is dying to get you heels up or if it would actually kill him.”

Gelusael shot a furious look to his evil twin, “And he doesn’t know if he craves you saying you love him again with every last breath he takes, or if the sound of it would make his unworthy self happy to wither away.”

The demon shrugged, pulling his phone out and tapping a few numbers, “So?  Listen, if no one is fucking anyone I’m going to meet these two girls for a snack.”

“Oh, no you aren’t,” Nora grabbed the phone and tossed it into the fireplace that she didn’t use to have and wasn’t sure was real, too furious and sick of the two of them to care that it was probably dangerous.

The cell flared and exploded.  Gel spun, so he was between her and the fire, his wings springing from nowhere to take the brunt of it, while Loki spread his arms and laughed, letting the debris strike him and burn away against his greater heat.

Maura and Thomas rushed down the stairs, both of them with hands stained with ink and ichor.  They had been writing out a new spell, using one of Gelusael’s feathers and some of Loki’s blood.

“What the feck?”  Maura’s accent always got stronger when she was upset.

Thomas raised a hand and then gracefully turned his wrist so two of his fingers pointed up, making the caustic smoke from the burning device shoot up the chimney, taking all of the bits of melted slag and plastic with it. 

“Your cousin decided that I needed less screen time,” Loki said, pulling off his ruined shirt and tossing it into the fire, stretching like a waking cat.  “Jealousy is sooooo sexy, little witch. And so unnecessary. I would happily feast on you alone,” he said, winking at Nora. 

Gel lowered his wings, slowly.  “Nora,” his voice was calm and a little cold, as if there hadn’t just been an explosion, “I too have a request of you.  I would like to take you to dinner tonight. And perhaps… perhaps we might go out afterwards. Just us. The house has been rather crowded of late and I would like to have some time with you alone.”

He looked fondly at Maura, who was firmly #teamgelusael since Nora was the  _ only  _ one who seemed to really understand that he and Loki were the same being, and less so at Thomas. 

The Chaos Twins had a few things in common, and immediate antipathy with the wizard was one of them.

“I, um-” 

A date?

“How kinky!” Loki exclaimed, clapping his hands, so he was suddenly dressed in lean cut black on black suit, his normally wild hair ever so slightly tamed back from his blazing, black horns, and was holding a bouquet of chocolate red roses that perfumed the air with musk, driving out the last of the burning plastic smell.  He offered them to her with a flourishing bow, his tail straight up behind him, the tip twitching like that of a mischievous cat.

“Then, if I might have the honor of taking you out tomorrow night?”

“That’s Christmas Eve,” Gelusael said with a grumping noise.

“I was aware.  Don’t worry, I have something perfect in mind.”

Nora looked from the demon to the angel and then back.  Even though they were both as beautiful as ever, she could see, if she looked close, that there was something off about both of them.  Gelusael’s perfect, raven black hair had here and there a strand that had gone translucent, as if fading. And Loki’s horns, though still burning and glorious, seemed just the slightest bit duller, like knives that could still cut but needed honing.

Her heart hurt.  

“Fine.  Tonight you, tomorrow you.”

The two of them nodded to each other, one solemn, the other gleeful.  “A word to the wise, precious,” Loki said to Nora. “No matter how nice he seems, never forget, he’s the one who started the war in heaven, not me.  I’m just the consequence of his actions.”

 

Maura poured tea for herself and Nora.  Thomas had gone back to work, and the boys - she couldn't help but call them that in her head - were off doing whatever they did.  

It was probably saner not to know, she thought. 

“Are you sure it’s sane, going on a  _ date _ with those two?” Maura asked her cousin, sitting beside her at the kitchen table and giving her hand a good squeeze.

Nora sighed and rested her head on Maura’s shoulder, giving her a shock.  Nora was resilient, always had been. It was a family trait, being witches meaning that you dealt with a lot more madness, beauty, and the Weird of the world than most.  But she had been the toughest, rolling with everything, being the one to offer comfort and sensible advice in the midst of the worst situations.

Like the first time Maura’s _ relationship  _ with the Morrighan had manifested itself.

At a concert.

In the mosh pit when some too old to be there asshole had poggo’d into her, copping a feel.

She had called Nora in tears, everyone in her family in Ireland a little freaked out and scared of her to help.  Sleepy voiced, Nora had gushed, “That is the fucking coolest! He’ll never try that shit again. Actually, he may not be physically able to, right?  I am  _ so motherfucking proud  _ of you.  Now you just need to figure out that aggression… Krav maga?”

A little awkwardly she reached over and patted Nora’s hair.  “You’re in love with them, aren’t you?”

“Him,” Nora said, sniffling a little bit.  

“Yeah, him, then.”

“I do.  And I’m worn out, and I know I’m going to lose him.  In a few more days he’s going to poof off into nothingness.”

“You could always choose one, you know.”

Nora straightened up, angry, “And if you had to choose half of Thomas to save, could you?  If you had to pick the way he looks at you when he wants to fuck you on the table at breakfast or the way he remembers every little thing that you prefer - how you take your coffee, your favorite pair of socks, that you hurt your right arm badly once as a child and so it’s easier if he sits on your left?  Could you choose one of his eyes over the other? What he looks like when he wakes up in the morning, smiling to see you, over what he looks like as he falls asleep at night, sated and happy?

“Not that I know what that last one looks like…” she grumbled to herself.

“I’m sorry,” Maura felt terrible.  If she and Thomas hadn’t been so distracted by each other things might have gone differently and been resolved months ago.

“No, I’m sorry,” Nora said, sad and disgusted.  “You should be planning your wedding, not dealing with m-”

Maura put a hand to her cousin’s mouth, “A wedding I wouldn’t be having if it weren’t for you, remember.”

Nora pushed her hand down, smiling with a laugh, “Then it’s worth it,” she said, pulling Maura into a hug, “then if you are happy, if he makes you happy, then it’s all worth it.”

_ No it isn’t, _ Maura thought,  _ but I’ll make it worth it, no matter what _ .

 

Not sure what to wear for a date with an angel, Nora had found an old cocktail dress of Claire’s.  It was deep blue silk with a full skirt and little rhinestones at the waist and hem. With it she wore sheer hose and high-heeled, satin shoes, and pulled her hair back in a little bun.  

Going through the family jewelry box, she even found a string of pearls.

Maura squee’d.  “You look like a ballerina, or a princess.  You need a tiara.”

“I need a martini and a psychiatric evaluation.  This isn’t me.”

“He’ll love it.” 

Nora sighed, and then slipped on a plain, camels hair coat that someone had probably left after a party since it wasn’t something either she or Claire would have bought.  “Yeah.”

Thomas looked up from where he was working near her altar, dressed in full wizard’s robes, holding an open tome of ancient lore in one hand and an Italian beef sandwich in the other, since he refused to take a dinner break.  “You look lovely, Nora. Truly,” he said, going back to his reading.

Gelusael stood at the foot of the stairs, dressed in an impeccable suit of grey, all sharp creases and crisp perfection from the windsor knot of his tie to the bow of his oxfords, even his wings were tucked away to wherever they went when he wasn’t using them.  Loki was sitting in the living room, watching a triple XXX, especially kinky version of The Quiet Man. 

It really wasn’t that different from the original, from what she could see.

He was also clearly trying to pretend he wasn’t interested in what was going on in the foyer.  And failing miserably, since he called out, “Ah, your prom date is here, brother. Hope you have enough room in the back seat of your car to pop her cherry.  Sorry, that would be  _ your  _ cherry that needs popping, isn’t it?”

Ignoring him, Gelusael took her hand, his own being icy, “You do look perfect,” he said, brushing the air near her fingers with his lips.  “Shall we?”

They stepped out into the brilliant cold of the night, with a deep black sky and a full moon, and for a moment Nora wondered how they were getting wherever they were going.  Then there was a whoosh of wings and even more frigid air, and they were aloft with her cradled in his arms. “WHHHAAAHHHH!”

“Not to worry,  _ laetitia,  _ you are perfectly safe.”

“That can’t be true,” she said, turning her face to his chest.  

“At least from falling,” he said.  “You shiver. Apologies.” Rather than pull her closer, he simply picked up speed.  

“I got it,” she said, and then with a quick, Gaelic cantrip, she was toasty and could appreciate the view of the city, its tall buildings were castle spires of gold, green, and red lights for the holiday, suddenly ending at the lake, which was like a wall of darkness.  It was beautiful and when she made a noise of appreciation he stopped in the air, standing on nothing so she could enjoy the view.

“It’s hard to believe that humans created such a thing…” he said.

“Watch it, buddy.  I’m human.”

He looked down at her, an amused look on his face, “Yes, and I always find that a surprise.  But then I see the mess you leave in your bedchamber each morning and am reminded a-new.”

She snorted at him, “On James, this spell only lasts fifteen minutes.  Where are we going?”

He gave her a sphinx like look, “You’ll see.”

 

Nora had heard of the Temple of Pizza and it’s famous live band karaoke, but she rarely made it much farther north than Chicago Ave and so had never attended.  Despite the line, they were quickly ushered in, surrounded by cries of outrage from the crowd that had been waiting. Inside it was steamy warm and smelled of garlic and beer.     

She’d always wanted to come here, but her southsider blood had never allowed it.  Now, here she was. 

Gelusael helped her off with her coat. When she sat down Nora couldn’t help but notice she her dress’s neckline was several inches higher and the skirt was more than several inches longer.  

“Um, could you-”

Before she could tell him to put it back, the waiter, a tall blonde man who was clearly smitten with Gel arrived at their table.  “We will have a classic margherita with extra basil, the lady will have a Sierra Celebration, and I’ll be fine with water. I’m, er, driving.”

Just what she would have wanted.  

Micah, the waiter, fell over himself stepping away to get the order, mouthing to Nora, “Nice…”

“Now,” Gelusael leaned across the table, eyeing the list of songs that could be chosen for Christmas Karaoke, “what will show your voice to its best effect?”  He smiled shyly at her. “I remember it is splendid…” 

Then he flushed, remembering what she had sung the one other time he’d heard her voice.

Nora laughed and took the list from him.  He was adorable.

 

Nora sang a version of “Christmas Waltz” that would have made Peggy Lee proud.  By the time she was done several couples had gotten up to slow dance, at least three had decided to move in with each other, and there was one spontaneous marriage proposal.

 

Afterwards, Gelusael tucked a scarf around her, told her to use her cantrip again, and took her dancing twenty feet over the Chicago river, each of their steps catching on an icy breeze, so they spun and twirled effortlessly.  And she sang to him as they danced.

“ It's that time of year when the world falls in love

Every song you hear seems to say

"Merry Christmas, may your New Year dreams come true

And this song of mine in three-quarter time

Wishes you and yours the same thing too…”

His shoulder was firm beneath her hand, and he leaned over her protectively as they waltzed along the south branch, and she was breathless and warm even when the spell wore off.  “This is the most ridiculously romantic thing I’ve ever done. That anyone has ever done,” she said, leaning her head against his shoulder as the waltz turned into just swaying. “I’m not very romantic, actually.”

Gelusael nuzzled against her hair, breathing deeply, “I think you are a liar.  I think you are romantic, I think you crave it, but have learned to do without.  You should never do without anything…”

It was a little after midnight when he lightly stepped off of the air, placing her on the porch of her bungalow, still smiling.  “You dance as beautifully as you sing, Nora,” he said, pulling the collar of her coat together.

“Anyone could dance well on the air.  But I do ok,” she said, “you were amazing.  So graceful.” It had been enchanting and perfect, and she could tell the color in his normally pale cheeks was a blush and not from the cold, since cold he did not get.

She was giddy.

And then she kissed him and ruined everything.

At first it was fine.  More than fine. It was wonderful.

His arms slid about her, pulling her closer than even when they had been dancing, so she could feel his breath coming heavier as she taught his lips to part, his tongue to seek, his mouth to soften and accept hers.  His long fingers stroked her hair and then suddenly fisted it.

The kiss turned more aggressive, and she pushed her pelvis forward, feeling his cock, as impressive as his twin’s, grow thick and throb against her.  He moaned needily against her, moving his mouth to devour her neck and he started to hump against her, slowly, gracefully, but definitely humping. Helpless in the face of his sudden arousal.

Nora reached between them, her hand barely able to make it so hard was he crushing her to him, and had barely run a fingertip over the engorged, wool-covered head of his cock when he stepped back, a look of disgust on his face as he wiped his mouth with the back of a half-closed hand.

“All humans are the same, nothing but appetite and taking!”  

Now Nora stepped back, as if she had been struck, “Yeah, humans.  You seemed pretty hungry yourself, Gel.”

“Because I am cursed!  Because I betrayed my heavenly brethren and sistern I am cursed even when I returned to my rightful self!  Cursed to lust and rut and to crave human filth.”

Now she really felt struck, straight to the heart.  “Right. Well, don’t worry, this human filth is going to take herself to be alone.  No more temptation here, buddy.”

He sagged, his eyes terrible, his perfect face a mask of guilt, “Nora, I didn-”

Letting herself into the house, she shook her head, “But you did.”

 

The next night Loki knocked lightly on Nora’s bedroom door and then looked askance at her.  

“Not really what I thought you would be wearing tonight, but if you are comfortable…”

After Gel’s response to her the night before she’d just not had it in her to get ready for their date.  She was still wearing the old, green plaid dress she’d worn Christmas shopping earlier in the day, with her hiking boots and her knee socks.  

“But unlike him I care about things making you happy.  Not things being perfect. Now shall we go? I have reservations for midnight Revellion at Commander’s Palace and a private plane waiting, with the champagne already cooling.”

He offered her his hand, smiling.  Looking gorgeous. He wore a long coat of black velvet but had a sheen of green brocade like a peacock’s tail, with suede leggings that were held closed with a green satin cord, tucked into boots that were buffed to the same mirror shine as his horns.  He wore no tie, just an loose green scarf, so his silk shirt flared open showing the hollow of his throat, at his wrists it boiled from beneath his coat sleeves in a thick fall of lace, and there was a faint, seasonal, jingle from the silver slave bracelet he wore.

Nora gave up.  He was like an 18th century dandy rock star.

“You really wouldn’t care if I went like this, would you?”

“Not at all.”

She sat carefully on her bed, as if she were going to break, “Then make me happy,” she whispered to the ground.

“Oh, treasure…” Loki groaned, kneeling before her, stroking her hair away from her face so he could cup her cheek, his lace caressing her, tickling her... “yes…” 

He kissed her.

His mouth was hot enough to burn, but she craved it after the equally burning cold of Gelusael’s look the night before.  She wanted him to burn out the memory of how ashamed she had felt. Something she had never felt before. 

He gently suckled on her tongue, his hands on her waist, and he stood, pulling her with him. “I’m going to make you come so hard  _ he’s  _ going to feel it,” she said, and then hated herself for it.

Loki rested his forehead on her’s and laughed softly, “Oh, revenge fucking. My favorite flavor.”

She shook her head, “No, no, I didn-”

But he ignored her, tracing a hand down the side of her dress so it turned to ash, burning away her bra and panties as well, leaving her in nothing but her stockings and boots.  Here and there, cinders touched her, making her jump and leaving marks like tiny bites over all over her skin.

“Poor little witch,” he crooned against her mouth, running his hands over her, finding every spot where the embers had landed.  Rather than hurting, the intense heat of his hands soothed each one of them, turning them into points of pleasure, so she writhed against him, her core melting and starting to pulse in time with each touch.  

Laying her across her bed, he caged her with his body, now naked as well.  Nora hooked a finger into one of his nipple rings, this one hung with a black pearl, and twisted it to pull him down to kiss her.  His groan turned into a moan, as he pushed his thigh between her legs and rubbed on her wet, his tongue dancing over her lips, against the delicate skin under them so she arched and ground against his leg, and then fucking into her mouth.

Wild with wanting and heartsick, Nora just needed him to be in her.  No polish, no more foreplay, just an annihilating fuck that would leave her mindless for a few, blessed moments at least.  “Please just… just…” she tried to form words, but nothing would come as he ground himself mercilessly against her clit, the wet from her rolling down his thigh.

“Do you want me to fuck you?  Hard and fast? I can taste it on you.” 

He sat back on his heels and shoved her legs apart, pushing two long fingers deep into her, curving them up so he could lean over and fuck against her g-spot with them, while leering at her as she fell apart.  “You are holding my fingers so nice and tight. Like you never want to let them go, but this is what you really want, isn’t it, little witch?” 

With his free hand he stroked himself, his long fingers around the thick base of his penis, moving lazily, even as his other fingers worked her faster and faster, taking her to the very edge and then stopping, pulling out so he could tenderly pet her clit, now jerking himself without mercy.

His tail had snaked between them to wrap itself tightly about her.

Struggling against frustrated pleasure, Nora sat up and grabbed his horns close to the base, staring into his eyes, their fathomless hellfire almost gone, subsumed by the pure black of his blown irises.  She used his horns to pull his head back and bit the side of his throat just below his ear. His breath hitched. She could feel him hold for a moment, even as he vibrated in her grip, beneath her teeth, against her skin.

Then he threw her back, legs still wide, and tossed her legs over his shoulders so he could fuck her as deep, as hard, as unkindly as they both needed.  Each jolt of his huge cock in her moving her farther up the bed until she had to raise her arms above her head and grab the candlestick wickets of her headboard to keep from being driven into them, so she was more open to him.  

His talons pinched her nipples hard, and her cunt gushed and spasmed as a drop of blood ran down each of her breasts.  “Poor love,” he said, biting his lip with one of his fangs. 

Moving her legs to his waist, he leaned forward and licked her nipples so his blood healed her, his blood moved in her, and she caught fire as his demonic need flooded her veins, making her thrash and scream as wave after wave of orgasm took her, her cunt gripping him and trying to pull him deeper, her arms clasping around him and to hell with her head, her hips raised to make as much contact as she could, needing it to never end.

Finally, after who knew how long, she fell spent and he kissed her mouth, her neck, her cheek over and over, open mouthed and greedy for as much of her as he could take.  “My turn,” he mumbled, tilting her so he could drive in again, clearly on the edge himself and more than ready to fall over.

Then a wave of cold blew into the room, stirring the curtains, frosting the window over, and sending the cat - who Nora hadn’t realized was sleeping on the end of the bed - off to find somewhere warmer to be with a disgruntled “mrrpt,” and a haughty crook to her tail.

Gelusael spoke from the doorway, his voice as dark and cold as the vast spaces between the stars, his divine nature like a pressure bearing down on them.  “If you have quite finished, based on our agreement I am here to claim my share. If you stand by your word, treasure.”

Ice and distaste dripped from the last word.  

Nora sat up, making Loki roll to the side where he propped himself weakly on an elbow to smirk at Gel, his tail unspooling from around her, with a slowly teasing touch. He was still erect, but looked no more perturbed than if he had been interrupted watching an old movie he had seen many times before. That was, as her cousin would probably say, a little lowering.  

So much for those lovely moments of oblivion she’d hoped for.

She refused to cover herself.  She let the angel see all of her, debauched and soaked, her body marked by his other half, streaked with soot and sweat, still trembling with little shocks of pleasure, despite the bucket of cold water he had effectively tossed over them.  “Fine. I’m as good as my word. Always have been.”

It took every bit of her to not pull all of the blankets over her and curl up and away from the look in  his eye. To pretend she didn’t care that he was disgusted and that Loki was amused. But she refused. Maybe he thought she was a base, slutty human, but at least she had the dignity of being honest about herself.

Loki laughed, crawling off of the end of the bed and slinking by Gel, “Well, then, I’ll just give you some room. Although technically this was  _ my _ date night, so…”  Then he stopped and turned his head to whisper something that Nora couldn’t hear, his face hidden by his fall of hair.  

But she could see his long hands ball into fists.

With a shake of his head and another laugh, he started to leave when one of Gel’s hands shot out, pressing into the demon’s chest to stop him.  He looked at Nora as he spoke, his eyes taking in her body, from pointed toe to dishevelled hair. 

He bit his lip and looked away, and then at Nora again.  His eyes were damp, and yearning. “No, you stay demon. I have need of your… expertise.”  

  
  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Peggy Lee - The Christmas Waltz https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qRhhse3-AqM


	4. Two Idiots, No Waiting

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nora, the angel, and the demon work out a few things.

_ Christmas Day Evening _ -

It was snowing again, the rare and perfect Christmas snow that Chicago almost never saw anymore, and Nora’s house was quiet for the first time in longer than she could remember.  Maura and Thomas had gone somewhere, and she and the Brothers Tribulation had slept away a good part of the day. 

She thought of having a coffee, and then made herself a tea and whisky instead, with extra honey and cream, because why not?  There was only another day or two, or maybe three, before she either had to pick one of  _ them _ or lose every part of  _ him _ forever and her heart ached at the thought.

Not that there hadn’t been plenty of times recently that she had thought how peaceful her life would be without him.  He hadn’t exactly been Prince Charming on the best of days, and lately had been far from his best.

Well, until last night.  Not that charming was quite the word for any of that.

Part of her body trembled a little at the memory, and she smiled softly, “Down, girl.” 

Nora sat down on her couch - the old one Claire had had forever, since she had put her foot down at it being replaced - and clicked on the tree lights, tucking her feet up under the black velvet robe.  It was lined with pine green cashmere and was the most hilariously luxurious thing imaginable. Almost as wonderfully comfortable as waking up with the two of him. It had been draped over the chair at the foot of her bed, the cat nesting in it, when she had woken up.  

A fall of green and black and the cat had been very unhappy to be moved, but she had stretched and climbed into the bed to nestle in the space between the angel and the demon, looking at Nora like she was crazy to leave such a prime piece of real estate.

Sipping at the tea that would never grow cold - Loki had done something to her mugs - looking at the evergreen that was somehow still alive - thanks to Gelusael’s angelic powers - Nora felt tears want to form, and her mouth turning downwards as she wondered if those gifts would fade when their creator did. Pressing her face against her knees, she tried to make them stop.

“Oh, no, don’t.”  

His voice was so soft and deep and he sat next to her, wrapping his arms about her, covering her with his body, hiding her from everything else.  “We aren’t worth it. That we caused it is proof of that. No male that makes you cry deserves your tears.”

For a few moments Nora allowed herself to just be held.  

“I have a question,” she shrugged out of his arms, and looked him in the eye.  “Why are you trying to get me to pick him?”

“I-, I’m not,” he was clearly shaken.

Nora raised an eyebrow and cocked her head, waiting for a proper answer.

 

_ The night before, or Christmas Eve at the Walsh house, and straight on through morning, and part of the afternoon _  -

“Um… what?” Nora asked, finally sitting up and pulling all of the blankets she could reach over her so she was covered to her neck.

Loki clapped a hand on Gelusael’s shoulder, grinning ear to ear, his still damp cock bobbling slightly as if it was also gleeful.  “I told you, treasure, he needs a little expert advice. And trust me, I would not leave your delightful body in the keeping of this hamfisted flamingo.  At any rate, five minutes of touching you and he’s probably going to explode like a feather pillow in a sorority based porno, and then we can get back to something truly heavenly.”

“In all of the stupid shit I agreed to I don’t remember agreeing to that!”  She waved a hand at the two of them.

Gelusael shrugged Loki’s hand off with a growl, and sat next to Nora on the bed, his head down, “I hate to admit he is correct.  My nature has made me less than gentlemanly to you in the past, not simply last night but from the first moment that I … that this part of me,” he flicked out a wing and then tucked it back into nothingness, “was reborn in the ecstacy you wrought in that creature’s unworthy form.”

Loki sketched a bow, and then sat on the other side of Nora, offering her a glass of champagne from the bottle he was sipping from.  “It’s true. He’s been a real asshole.”

“As if you have not, you-”  Gel started to stand up, shaking a finger at his twin.

Nora sighed.  

Who was she kidding?

She grabbed Gel’s tie and pulled his mouth to within a breath of her’s.  “I’m going to kiss you. I’m going to straddle you, all naked and defiled as I am, and I am going to kiss you.  You get one chance to not mess this up or you can go perch on the roof for the rest of your existence because I will never speak to you again.  Clear?”

His eyes were wide, stunned, and horny as hell.  He made a noise of some sort.

Good enough.

Though her legs were shaking, she clasped herself about him, her thighs tight, her cunt resting against his cock where it ruined the lines of his perfectly tailored wool pants.  He was practically panting with need and his knuckles were pale where he clenched her sheets. Groaning, still sensitive, afraid of being hurt again, she put her mouth to his, open, waiting.

They breathed into each other a moment, and his eyes showed too much white, like a frightened animal.  

Neither moved.

There was a sound of champagne pouring and a sip being taken.

Then he put his arms about her, holding her tightly and yet with great care, and he gave over to her, kissing in great, messy gulps and licks.  Nora wrapped her arms about his head, snarling his hair, raising up so he had to stretch to kiss her, to follow her, to pursue, to claim, to show she was wanted.  

The kiss went on and on, it turned from aggressive and hungry to soft and generous, each of them wanting to give the other as many caresses, as much tenderness, as just as much as they could, then shifting towards the filthy.  Now her tongue was deep in his mouth, being sucked on, and she pulled his hair so she could move his head back and drive deeper in. 

His hand found her breast and for a moment he froze.  All motion stopped and they stared at each other, then his eyes closed and he sagged slightly, rubbing his thumb over her nipple, cupping tightly, then giving her his mouth again.  

She took him, riding him down to so he lay sprawled beneath her across the bed, lost in his need.  “Nora, my lady, I don’t know… “

“I do,” she looked at Loki who had lain down next to them, his chin on his palm, a smile of pure delight on his face.  “Would you? Because I’m afraid to stop touching him,” she said, bending back to kiss him again. 

“For you, treasure, anything you need,” he waved his free hand with a flourish of his wrist, tracing along the angel’s side, leaving naked, perfect skin as the clothing disappeared.

He was identical to the demon, save for no nipple rings.  Nora’s cunt fluttered like a maiden aunt wanting to be fucked.  But she stopped herself, not kissing him, just stroking his chest as if he were a wild creature that was like to run.

Was this even right?  Everything about sex had revulsed him before, had driven him away from her, so maybe she should -

“Sit on my chest so I can feel how wet you are,  _ laetitia,”  _ he moaned, he commanded.

Alright then.

Before she could slid up, long hands wrapped around her ribs and situated her on the angel’s broad, lean chest.  “I can’t help myself, now can I?” Loki asked as he swirled a clever tongue about her ear, so she writhed and rubbed herself on Gelusael.   

Now she was the one panting.

“Touch her where she is touching you,” he told the angel.  “Make her come all over you. Feel the pulse of her sex on you,” he added, as he cupped her breasts, pinching the place he had bitten open before, making her arch up against him, swearing.

There was a tentative touch between her legs, like he was poking her clit.

She and Loki both stopped and frowned at him, “It’s not a doorbell, Gel,” the demon scolded.

The touch turned into a rub, with Loki matching the touch on her nipples, his mouth matching it on her neck, her body turning to flame from their attentions, from the heat of him behind her, from the cool of him beneath her.

Gelusael took a deep, snarling breath, “Put her over my mouth.”

“I knew he had it in him,” Loki murmured to Nora as he lifted her and put her in place, where Gel’s plunging, fucking, starving, cold tongue impaled her, the contrast making her squeal, making the demon laugh affectionately in her ear.  “Curl your tongue, grab her thighs, and do not stop until your face is as wet as she is,” he ordered. 

Within moments Nora could barely hold herself in place as he wildly explored every bit of her core with his tongue.  She needed more pressure, and she ground on him, clamping him with her thighs, pulling his hair, using him to get her over the edge that kept dancing just out of her reach.  

He loved it.  The angel arched as high as she had, and the one corner of her mind that was still sane noted that he was probably rubbing himself on Loki the same way she was using him.  

The image of that was too much for her, and she fell into an orgasm that would have drowned a mortal.  

Lifting her limp body off of the angel so he could slide up to a sitting position, Loki shared a knowing look with his twin as he placed her over Gel’s waiting cock.  Nora had just enough strength to grasp his shoulders before sliding down, his length entering her, so familiar, so different, her wet and ready sex still stretched.

Gelusael’s wings sprung forth with a gust of wind, as his mouth took her again.

She heard Loki’s dry, soft laugh in her ear, “Now what’s left for me?  Ah, of course,” he gently toyed with her asshole, his fingers slick with more than just her wet.  It made her tighten and Gel groaned for pity, his head thrown back, his face tormented. “You’ve come to the wrong bed, little angel,” he said, as he entered her with one probing, clever finger.

Then another.  

Nora could not move fast enough back and forth, already sore and worn out and yet ready and wanting more than anything to make Gel come.  Wanting Loki to stop being so abstract, so amused.

“Are you just going to play, or are you going to get on with it?” she gasped out.

He bit her and then withdrew his fingers, just as Gelusael kissed her again, not really knowing what he was doing as his mouth went wild, kissing and gasping equally.

“We’re just getting started.  Stroke his wing,” Loki said, devil in her ear.

“No, no, don’t…” the angel said, and Loki shifted so he could now fuck Nora’s ass with his fingers and stroke himself, so she tightened again about Gel’s cock, moving the little she could between them.  “Too much… do it. Touch me,” he begged her.

Nora’s hand shook, and she was too weak with lust and closeness, so Loki lifted it for her, putting it on the fine, gracile bone on the top of one of the wings.  She stroked his feathers, the softest, the coldest, and with that gentle touch Gel’s hips snapped up, fucking her hard from beneath, his head thrown back, and the orgasm waved out from his body, taking her, taking the demon, so she screamed and seized and he boiled over, his hot sperm burning against her side, his fingers still working in her, the angel’s cock still throbbing as his pleasure went on and on. 

They collapsed together, a heap of feathers, horns, and trembling girl, her eyes screwed closed as tight as she could, waiting to be left alone.

A tender kiss brushed her temple, another over her belly.  She opened her eyes.

Loki looked up at her, grinning, “Not bad for round one,” he said, nuzzling her stomach.

Gelusael’s head drooped over hers, sighing, “Thank goodness the night is young.”

 

_ Elsewhere, in the house _ \- 

It wasn’t the noise that was getting to Thomas.  The moans and cries, and blessedly muffled words.

Or the occasional thump that rattled the walls, floors, and ceilings.

Or even the intoxicating, rich mix of angelic arousal which smelled of incense and wintery wind and demonic musk, redolent of burning forests and, weirdly, apples.  Both of which thankfully covered any scent from Maura’s cousin. 

It was the pheromones.  

Again.  

Apparently the tinctiture Nora and Maura had made to block the incubus’s pheromones did not work on the angel’s.  

Which meant they were driving him crazy.  And worse, they were driving Maura crazy, which was killing him.  The way she shifted in her seat time and again, her legs rubbing together, her pretty, peaked breasts moving in under her jumper, licking her lips and flushing with -

“We should get out of here,” she said, staring at his crotch, then shaking her head and meeting his gaze with lust filled eyes.

Now he shifted uncomfortably.

“Yes, Go do something as unsexual as possible.  Something that will just kill any and all sex drive we have.”

Maura tilted her head thinking, “The cinema should be open by now, even on Christmas Day.  And that new Will Ferrell film where he does an English accent just opened.”

“Appalling.  Perfect. That would even kill the incubus’s erection.  Get your coat.”

 

_ Sometime (and many lurid acts later) _ \- 

Loki sighed, rolling Nora over so he could spoon her, and she was drowsily surprised that his penis seemed quiescent for the first time in recorded history.  He nuzzled the hair on the back of her head and sighed, his tail draped over her leg. Gelusael, exhausted and not thinking, not able to think, lay facing her, his forehead barely touching hers, his wings, normally cool but now perfectly warm, covering all three of them.  

 

_ Later that evening, back by the Christmas tree _ -

“I have a question,” she shrugged out of his arms, and looked him in the eye.  “Why are you trying to get me to pick him?”

“I-, I’m not,” he was clearly shaken.

Nora raised an eyebrow and cocked her head, waiting for a proper answer.

Loki sat back, the tenderness of his expression gone, replaced by amusement.  He was dressed in an open silk robe at was clearly meant to distract her, but she stayed on point, drinking tea and giving him a stare until he finally shrugged.

“Why would you assume that was my intent?”

“Because prior to last night you were trying your damnedest to get me and him into bed.  And you stayed last night to ensure everything went … amazingly.”

He shrugged again, a graceful lift and drop of his shoulder, “As has been said, I am obsessed with you.  Utterly obsessed. Watching you come apart in his arms, seeing your pleasure, aiding in it, is my greatest delight.  It is the one thing that I could offer you that he was heretofore incapable of. Rather spectacularly incapable. Now we seem to have straightened that out, so you can fix him and I can dissipate into nothingness in, if not peace, at least the secure knowledge that you will be cared for.”

Nora’s heart raced hard enough to make her sick, “But, why?”  She still didn’t get it. “Why wouldn’t you try to get me to pick you?”

For a moment he gave her a look as if about to make a joke, and then couldn’t.  He stood, clearly needed to move away from her, and paced as he spoke.

“Because he can love you.  He does love you. It’s painful, really, to watch him moon after you.  Thousands of years of repression can do that sort of thing. And I cannot.  Demons cannot love and there is nothing to me but demon, since my angelectomy.  It rages through me. I fight it constantly now, the desire to fuck and take, to feed until I am surrounded by the flesh of my victims and death.  And one day, if you were to choose me, I would succumb. One day I would leave your bed, with you dead in it because I could no longer hold back, and the orgy of madness I would engage in at the loss of you would terrible beyond your worst dreams.”

He stopped and smiled at her again, head cocked, eyes thin, melancholy and loving, even if he couldn’t recognize the love himself.  “So you have to pick him. He will treat you like a goddess. Angels were created to worship, the old man is a narcissist that even I bow before, and he would worship you if you let him.  I should know. I wanted to worship you when he and I were still one, after all. I just did a shitty job of it. Because, demon.”

He laughed.

“I would worship you, Nora,” Gel’s voice was quiet.  He was dressed, although casually for him, in black pants and a grey sweater.  “I would worship you for both of us. Try to love you enough for both of us,” he nodded to Loki.

They both looked at her, expectantly, waiting for her to say the word.  To pick. 

“You are such a moron.  You don’t understand a thing about me, do you?  Then how can you love me, or whatever you want to call it?” she said to them, “I need a shower.  Maura and Thomas should be back soon, so you better get started on dinner.”

They watched in blessed silence as she went upstairs.

 

When the guests returned an hour later, looking nervous and then relieved to see Loki dressed and finishing a rum chocolate mousse and Gelusael putting the finishing touches on his centerpiece, Nora was long gone.

  
  



	5. Fools Rush In, In All of the Expected Places

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Now, with a special guest star!

 

Maura rushed into Nora’s bedroom, relieved and annoyed that Gelusael’s persnicketiness and sense of shame meant that everything was in order, with fresh bedding and the air smelled of nothing more than fresh linen and lilies of the valley.  She grabbed her cousin’s hairbrush and then realised that the angel’s fetishistic need for cleanliness had left it impossible for her find a stray hair or anything else that would make using the lodestone easier as they tried to track her cousin.

The house was so clean you could probably eat off of the garbage. 

Fucking angel!  

The goddess that slept in the back of her head was stirring like she always did when something was at its most wrong.  

Maura was trying not to be angry with Nora.  But it was damned hard. 

Yes, she’d been through a lot.  And clearly her pussy had been through even more last night and most of today if the noises they had heard her and her two lovers making were anything to go by.  Who wouldn’t want to get out for a bit of air? But she had a feeling this was more than just a normal stroll and that her cousin was about to do something really, really stupid.

Especially now.

Thomas, horrified by the surrealistic nightmare of Will Ferrell endeavouring to do even a comedy British accent, had spent most of the movie working through the trickiest part of the incantation he needed.  Then, standing up during an especially unfunny and painful scene involving Queen Victoria, he had shouted, “I’m a bloody idiot!”

He’d gotten more laughs than the movie and she’d had to run after him as he bolted out of the cinema.

As they had careened about the streets of Chicago, slightly lost and only not getting a ticket by virtue of driving Aunt Claire’s old car that she had bespelled to make it invisible to the police, back to her cousin’s house he had explained to her that their entire approach the the problem had been wrong.

“I blame myself.  I keep trying to fix a mistake made by having a witch use sorcery by having a witch use more sorcery.  Granted, if the first spell hadn’t been interfered with it probably would have done it’s job and we could all move on, but instead we’ve gone from problematic to disastrous with a detour into plain freaky.”

Maura snorted at Thomas using the word ‘freaky’ but he spoke over her.  “We need a witchcraft answer.”

“I hate to tell you this, Sir,” she tried to sound respectful to keep herself from getting a spanking that she wanted but that they probably wouldn’t have the time for, “but Nora and I have been working on just that and no joy.”

He reached over and gave her knee a firm, nearly painful, but still quite affectionate, little squeeze, “I know, baby, but as gifted as you both are, this is going to require a bit more experience than you’ve had time to acquire.”

Now, back at home, she ran back down the stairs, almost wiping out where the runner had come loose, and having to jump down the last three.   “Nothing,” she said, as she entered the kitchen where the three tall, gorgeous men were standing around the table. “You bloody neat freak!” she said giving the angel a shove that didn’t move him at all but caused several of his feathers to fall out.  “What did you do to her this time?”

He was moulting.

That couldn’t be good.

They were running of out time.  The demon looked weary, his eyes more guttered to grey than burning with hellfire.  Neither of them spoke. Gel at least looked guilty, but she guessed that it was actually impossible for a demon’s face to form that expression.  Anyway, they were paying already. They would be gone and Nora would be heartbroken and Maura felt helpless and the stirring of a familiar, warlike rage that would be very unhelpful to any of them, especially the house.    

“I can find her,” Loki said, frowning.  “I’m sure of it.”

Gelusael nodded.  “I shall go aloft.  Perhaps I can see her from the air.”

“Nora’s a witch, and this is her hometown.  Neither of you are going to find her if she doesn’t want to be found, and I am guessing she doesn’t,”  Maura rummaged through the garbage. Even the can was perfectly clean. 

Probably new.

“FUCK!”

“Right,” Thomas said, reaching down and plucking the cat from where she was crouched, idly chewing on some dry food, and placing her on the table.  The rest of them gathered around, confused. He leaned over the cat, who was sitting neatly, her tail wrapped about her toes. 

Raising a twig of rosemary above it’s head, Thomas commanded, “Ⲙⲟⲩⲧⲉ, ⲥⲉⲃ!”  His voice was deep and resonant with power, and the lights dimmed and flashed and then came back to normal.  Although the old light fixture that swung over the table did smoke just a bit.

Maura looked at Loki, who gave a begrudging nod of appreciation, “Coptic, not exactly ancient Egyptian, but most cats will at least understand the intent.  Clever, wizard.”

The cat looked up at him, her head cocked to the side, and then said, in the raspy, yet still musical, voice of an old woman who liked her cigarettes and her Bacardi not wisely but too well, “Not bad, wiz-boy, but it would work better with cannabis or fennel.  Still, pretty good.”

“Aunt Claire?”  Maura asked.

The cat tilted her head to the other side, “Sort of?”

 

The Garden of the Phoenix was closed when Nora arrived.  The Uber driver had not wanted to leave her alone in Jackson Park after dark on a holiday when no one was around, but she’d thanked her for the concern and slipped a little spell of forgetting along with her tip.  

The footpath that led from the park out onto the island where the garden sat quiet and still in the snow had a tiny barricade that she spelled open and then closed behind her, wiping away her footprints at the same time.  

She crossed over the little, arching bridge over the lagoon and watched snow fall onto the water in perfect silence.  Then she continued past the garden proper, with its gently sleeping cherry blossom trees and gravel paths, to where Sky Landing, Yoko Ono’s abstract sculpture of lotus petals sat in a metallic silence.

Ignoring wet feet and everything else, she sat down in the middle of metal flower in a matching lotus position and closed her eyes.  Not that she was going to meditate. Meditation had never really worked for Nora, leaving her either impatient, or more often asleep sitting up.  It just seemed an appropriate pose for the location. 

Scared to death, she tried to take strength from the earth of her city, from the lake so close by, from the cold, open sky, and from the metal of the sculpture.  Nora wasn’t the biggest fan of Yoko Ono as a musician, and she didn’t care much about the Beatles for that matter, but she admired her spirit, her unyielding, unapologetic sense of herself as an artist and a citizen of the world, both rare for any woman even now, but much more so when she had come to fame and unfair notoriety.  

And right now she needed all the help she could get in the strength department. 

From her bag she pulled an athame.  Not her’s, or Claire’s, but one that was far older, sharpened over and over until it was just a curve of silver metal like a crescent moon, it’s sheath made of black wood that had once been adorned with gold and jewels but was now decrepit enough that she’d had to wrap duct tape around it to keep it from falling apart when she took it from the Cabinet of Curiosities in the attic.  The one where they kept the dangerous shit. 

The hilt was made of grey, polished stone, and felt strangely warm in her hand.  

The lick of metal on her wrist barely hurt.

Raising the blade to the sky, but addressing herself somewhere lower, she invoked :

  
_ “Me miseram! qui ita super me avolare _ _   
_ _ Infinitum ira infinita desperatio _ _   
_ __ Quod ita sit inferos me volare; ego sum inferos ".

 

And then added, 

  
_ Ita, si eisdem actum est in vobis, fiat scriptor Curabitur. _

 

Nothing happened.

Then, a voice that was beautiful and terrifying and wrong, asked, “Now where did you get that from?”

It was too high.  Or too low. It had no gender.  It had several. It had an accent that was no accent at all and it made her body bristle as every hair stood on end and it made her heart thud with too much sadness.

Nora held onto the knife, but let her hand down.  The blood coming from her wrist started to freeze, and she wasn’t sure if it was because of how fridgid the air was, or if the blood itself had gone that cold.  “Family lore says my great-grandfather Emmitt won it playing  _ vingt-et-un _ with one of the  _ aos sí.  _  It could be true.  We all like gambling.”

She kept her eyes politely averted as while she spoke and kept all of the sauce and sass out of her voice.  

Well, almost all.  The Walsh’s were all born smartasses and they tended to die that way.  Sometimes as a result of it.

“Clearly… Your pronunciation was hideous, and your choice of evocation bordered on insult.  Why should I not smear you beneath my shoe and drag what’s left to serve me as a footstool for eternity?”

“My understanding of what it means that I have this dagger is th-”  

She yelped as the knife was ripped from her hand, flying across the small space to land gently in an elegant, outstretched hand.  “Your understanding is faulty.”

Nora gulped, quickly dropping her eyes again, “Clearly.  But I already knew that.”

“What do you want,  _ praecantatrix _ ?”  Now the voice was very close, as the speaker was suddenly sitting behind her, whispering in her ear.  “You are shaking. So cold. So scared. So lost…”

“So desperate,” she whispered back, wanting to close her eyes tight like a child, but knowing it was a grave insult.  She also wanted to look. She wanted to look so very badly. To see him. Her body had already half turned before she stopped herself.

“Oh, I know what you want!  You are that one!” he laughed in her ear, and tossed dagger into her lap.  “You want Gelusael. You want Loki, as well. He is not mine to give, not any more, the selfish, spoiled little bastard.  Cruel, narcissistic, ready to betray and backstab at the drop of a hat, and that’s just the angelic part of him. Think of something else, another deal to make, before I grow bored and tear your liver from your body and chew it slowly, as you die.”

“And then drag me to hell to serve as your bath-mat?  No thanks. Although I am sure that Loki knows someone who would LOVE that, it you’re really in the market.”

Lucifer laughed.

“I see why he likes you.  No shame at all… Very well, witchling, what would you have of me?”

 

“I mean.  I’m a cat now.  Just as much as your aunt.”

Loki frowned down at the cat, who was now cleaning one of her ears with a lazy flick of her paw.  “Incredible. What were you doing at the mall?”

The cat cocked its head, “No idea.  But then, I never understood why anyone was at the mall when I was alive and human, either.  I was just there, and I think I smelled Nora on you. Plus, you’re so warm. I like that a lot now, warm spots.  Then Nora was there and here I am.”

Maura sat down, stunned, “Wait, so you have been sleeping in Nora’s room.  That means you’ve seen her… um…” 

She looked at Loki and Gelusael.  The angel looked sick. Even the demon went ever so slightly pale. 

The cat went back to washing her ear, “I know it sounds like I’m a pervert, but you can’t imagine how uninteresting and unattractive you monkey-types all look from a feline perspective.  I was mostly just annoyed that the bed kept shaking.”

“But -”  

Thomas cleared his throat, “As much as even I find this as fascinating as an especially gruesome car crash, the spell allowing your Aunt... er… Cat to speak is short term at best and can only be used once every ninety days.  We need to know if she can help us rejoin these two beings before Nora does something stupid, which I fear you may be right about. Something is bothering me about the house. It feels different… spiritually I would say. Af if something had been brought in or taken from it.  Something powerful. Something old.”

The cat lay down, now washing the inside of her right back leg, “Yeah, the other niece took the Athame of Hrotsvitha of Gandersheim with her.  So, you know, deal with the devil time.”

The series of holes that went from the kitchen ceiling through Claire’s old bedroom ceiling and then the roof were probably not going to be fixable, considering that they were large enough to allow an angel carrying a demon through them.

Thomas and Maura, who had snatched Cat Claire before they dove under the table, both pushed rubble out of the way, climbing to their feet.

“While they’re handling that situation go up the workroom and gather the broken bits of that statue that started all of this trouble, wrap it together tightly in an unbleached linen sheet with rosemary, marigold leaves, and the ashes of juniper, and then bury it twenty feet beneath my blackberry bush.  That should take care of his split body problem. By the time you’re done he should be of one mind with himself, or he’s never going to be.”

The cat jumped lightly out of Maura’s arms, picking its way through the wood and plaster.

“But what if they, I mean he, is too late?”  She asked her aunt.

“Meow?”

“Shit,” she and Thomas said as one.

 

The night had become perfectly still and Gelusael’s wings devoured the crystal sharp, windless sky in mighty push after push.  Loki had wrapped an one arm about his twin’s shoulder and another about his waist to keep from interfering with his speed of flight.

They followed the Morningstar’s scent of  _ ipomoea _ burning in brimstone.

“I cannot believe she would be this idiotic!”  One of them shouted to himself over howl of empty air refilling in their wake.

“Of course she is.  She loves us, so there is no end to how foolish Nora can be.”  One of them answered.

“If we weren’t in a hurry I’d rip your horns off and stuff them up your ass for saying that about her.  It’s true, but you shouldn't say it.”

There was silence and confusion.  Then-

“I do not have horns, I think.  And trust me, I would happily pluck your wings from your back and-

There was more silence and confusion.

“Do I have the wings?  I thought yo- never mind.  Hurry up or we won’t have Nora either.”

Again there was silence, and then onespoke, “We’re agreed, are we not?  About when we arrive? Whatever it takes.”

He nodded to himself, pinioning as he started to descend.

“He’ll probably start us all over again, from the beginning.  Back in the muck, back in the despair, the unholy, bone breaking need and -”  

One of them said.  Not certain themself who had spoken.

“But it would be worth it, to save her.”  

One of them said.  Not certain themself who had spoken.

“Yes.”

One of them said.  Not certain themself who had spoken.

 

Lucifer leaned closer to her back, “So, we have a deal?”

Each time he spoke she thought she was going to burst into tears for so many reasons.  Fear. Sympathy. Grief. Pain.

It was strange.  She would have expected him to burn as much as Loki did.  Maybe more. Or to leave her numb with cold. But neither was true.  Other than the weight of his presence and the tickle of his beard against her ear and the shade he threw from behind her, covering her own shadow and making it disappear it would be as if he wasn’t there at all.

He was a void, waiting for her to fall back into him.

Since she was a little dizzy with blood loss and exposure it could happen.  Afterwards. She needed to finish first.

“Yes.  How do we seal it?”

“We shake hands.  I am, after all, famously a gentleman.”

Nora rose unsteadily, her legs stiff, remembering to pick up the dagger, a hand that could have been an empty glove under her elbow giving her assistance.  All she had to do was turn around.

That was it.

Just turn.

She was going to turn now, she told herself.  

Right now.

“I do have other places to be…  And I would suggest you irk me no further,” came the voice, still behind her, too close to her.  

“Or you’ll fuck my eyeholes and turn the rest of me into your dish strainer?”

“More or less,” he chuckled.  “You are going to be such an amusing soul to play with, unless you would rather I kept Gelusael and the Incubus as they are and took  _ them  _ with me...”

That made her turn.  It would be worth it, maybe, just to see what went with that voice, and the void. 

And she would have, except at that moment a figure dropped easily to earth behind her, engulfing her with warmth and the smell of incense and musk.  

A strong arm wrapped itself about her waist, pulling her flush with his long body, and he growled at her, “We are going to have a very long conversation that you will not enjoy.”  

She half turned, “This isn-”

With a stunned noise, she stopped.  

He smiled at her, a smile to make anyone with sense shiver, tilting his head so his horns glinted in the moonlight.  “Not. Another. Word,” he advised, lifting her with one arm, then in a light, mocking voice, called out, “Ta, Lucy,” and taking to the air with one magnificent thrust of his wings, carrying Nora away.

  
  
  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hrotsvitha of Gandersheim was a 10th century canoness, playwright, and poet who wrote an extremely popular cycle of poems based on legends that involved people being saved from deals made with the devil.


	6. A Problem Halved is Still a Problem

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nora and Loki have sex. Really, what else was going to happen?

Chapter Six - 

Being suspended in mid-air above the city of your birth at midnight on a particularly cold Christmas, after trying and being stopped from making a deal with the devil, with blood trickling slowly down your arm and dripping from your fingertips, one boot lost and the other hanging from your toes, while your frozen legs dangle uselessly and you are having a little trouble breathing from both the chill and the tight arm around your waist as you are held aloft by a creature who seems to be very, very put out with you, can really clear the mind.

_ Or _ , Nora thought,  _ alternately it can make you black out _ .  

Which is what happened to her somewhere over the north branch of the Chicago river.

 

It was a soft, crackling noise, followed by a sound like a piece of wood splitting that woke her up, if that was what it could be called, since she had actually passed out rather than haven fallen to sleep.  

“Brought you around.  Or perhaps roused you, might be more technically correct, then,” an amused, husky voice whispered into her ear, which roused her the rest of the way.

Sitting up, clutching at nothing, Nora let out a strangled yelp, certain that she was falling to her death.

Rather than plummeting into the slushy depths of the river, Nora found herself on a lovely, large bed, with soft linens and a dark metal head and footer.  There was a huge, green marble fireplace with a cheery fire that made the pleasant noises that had interrupted her unconsciousness. The whole room was warm, elegant, and spare.  Floor to ceiling windows showed heavy snow falling on Grant Park.

It was far and away the most beautiful and romantic place she had ever been.  But also terrifying since she had no idea where she was.

“What?  Where?” There was a faint, buzzing in her head, and her arm hurt.  She looked at it, surprised to find a white bandage winding from her wrist to her elbow.  

Long fingered hands wrapped around her shoulders from behind, firmly pulling her back down against a pile of fluffy pillows.  Her ribs ached and she made a small  _ oof _ of pain as her back met the mattress.

“Normally my blood would be able to heal you entirely, but since it’s no longer purely angelic ichor, and that Athame contains a rather puissant curse to allow it to raise Lucy, so it is healing but not healed at this point.” 

Loki rolled over her, his hands on the pillow on either side of her head, his legs pinning the blanket over hers, his eyes narrow and blazing red, his horns razor-tipped.  She was trapped between him and the bed. “I am terribly piqued with you, little witch. Terribly. Piqued. So much so that I do not care a whit that your delicate arm must hurt like the blazes.”  

“Not just my wrist.  I am betting I’m covered in bruises from you hauling me up in-”

Then it hit her.

“You, you’re, you!  You’re both of you! Aren’t you?  I saw wings. We flew, I know we flew...” Nora tried to scrabble for purchase and words at the same time, wanting to sit up and make a point.  “What, what do I call you.”

With a very worrying smile, he let a bit more of his weight settle onto her, “I have to insist on your remaining supine.  I would be so cross is you undid my good work,” he added, braceletting her bandaged wrist with his fingers, holding it to the pillow.  He shifted slightly, so the ridge of his cock met the top of her sex, the smooth, soft sheets giving her a gentle bit of friction. She gave the faintest, breathiest exhale and then tried to squeeze her legs closer together so she could stay on topic.

Leaning close, so his hot, sweet breath stirred her hair and pooled in her ear, making her melt, “I have decided I prefer Loki.  I gave myself that appellation, I earned it, it is mine.”

Now his smile grew almost pitying, quickly moving his legs so they had spread hers wide beneath the blankets, working his hips easily so his erection blatantly rubbed her.  Even separated by the bedding and the leather of his pants it was like she could feel every vein and ridge dragging over her clit. 

Swallowing audibly, Nora’s voice was almost a squeak.  Incubus frottage was better than any actual intercourse she’d had with another lover. 

“I’m naked, aren’t I?”  she asked. “What happened to my dress, it- it-,  _ oh my god, yes,-  _ it was one of my favorites.”

He rolled his eyes upwards, as if looking for strength, and then started moving his cock in lazy circles against the now drenched sheets. She vaguely wondered if she could sneak them out in her purse since making a maid wash, or even touch the bedding after the two of them had been at in just seemed evil. Maybe they would have to just toss the mattress off of the balcony and run…. 

“Of course it was.  Anything that dull would have to be.  I burned it and then tossed the ashes to the four winds.  Lucy had touched it and it just reeked of brimstone and spoiled meat.  You will not be needing any clothing for the foreseeable future at any rate, pet.  You gave me quite the scare, trying to throw away your life  _ and _ your afterlife like that.  I am afraid that you owe me for the fuss and the upset, and there is only one type of recompense I accept.”

Now she did shove at him, and he laughingly rolled off of her, letting her sit up, “I owe you?  _  I  _ owe  _ you _ ?  After everything you have done to fuck up my life, and everything I’ve put up with,” she clambered out of the bed, ignoring the ache between her legs, pulling a loose throw from the end of the bed around her, then ignoring the soreness around her ribs, “trying to help you and get you back.  All of the home repairs, and expense, not to mention heartbreak and abandonment and I OWE YOU?” She paced and stormed, raving, and nearly losing her wrap, “You broke my heart over and over and left me feeling like I -, I don’t even have an emotion for how I felt and I OWE YOU? What the fuck is wrong with you and who the fuck do you think you are?”

She braced herself on the end of the bed, squeezing the metal bar, snarling.

Loki sat up and cocked his head, smiling but with sad eyes, “I have no idea who I am any longer, really, I mean I am still the same narcissistic, vain, manipulative, sex monster that I was when we met, but now with wings and inkling of right and wrong.  Just an inkling, mind you, treasure. Just enough to have been dealt a blow of the most existential terror imaginable at the idea of your precious, impossible self being tormented for eternity by that bastard. And he would still win, knowing that losing you forever to misery and anguish would annihilate me more thoroughly than anything he had done previously.  Not that I wouldn’t have been entirely as upset if I did not have any of my angelic nature back.

“I would have fucked half of the city dead in my rage, stealing their lives so I could assault the fiery iron caverns of Hell and free you from Lucy’s vindictive attentions.”

Nora started to say something.  Later she could never remember what she had planned on saying, because no sooner had she opened her mouth than he stood beside the bed, staring at her and started undressing.  He flicked open each button of Gelusael’s pristine, white, dress shirt, his pine black nails letting off little sparks as he worked his way down. All of the while he stared at her so she found herself looking from his fingers and chest to his eyes and mouth, which was slightly open, with one corner quirked up.  

He let the shirt fall off of his shoulders, gliding down his long arms, catching it at the last minute with his fingertips, then throwing it lazily over his shoulder so she could see each flex and pull of the long, smooth muscles of his arm, his chest.

Then, toying with the red jewel hanging from his nipple ring, with his free hand he unbuckled his belt, quickly pulling it free so it snapped like one of the logs cracking in the fire at her back.  Nora jumped and started to back away, but that also ended up tossed away with just a bit of extra fuss so she could savor the curve of his waist, his hips, his ass. 

“You smell so wet I could drown in you from here, my delicious pearl.  My nacreous, fragrant witch,” he twisted the nipple ring hard, gritting his teeth and snarling at her.  Nora had long since dropped the blanket she’d tried to cover up with, and was holding on to the footboard of the bed for dear life, feeling herself gravitating towards him, her body leaning, her heart thudding heavy and swift/  

He slowly unzipped his pants, each tooth catching for a second so it took forever.  They hung open, and his cock, now free and red and purple and lengthy and splendid, stood upright, bobbing gently as he wrapped his unoccupied hand about it, gliding up and down, hypnotising her, making her mouth water and wet drip down her legs.  

A slow swagger brought him to her, stopping close enough so his boney toes covered her curled ones.  He loomed over her, with newly lofty horns of alabaster. “I don’t know who I am, Nora, but I do know I am yours.  And that I am going to fuck you hard enough to knock some sense into that head of yours.”

“Shut up and kiss me, feathers,” she said, sliding her feet from under his so she could stand on her toes, wrapping her arms about his neck.

 

It was not how he had planned on the evening going.  At this point in the night he should still be raving at her like a madman about her stupid actions.  Taking her to task for even considering sacrificing herself for his unworthy self. But when she had fainted away in his arms, bleeding and clearly suffering from the poisonous that seeped from Lucifer’s very being.  It had already begun to tatter the very edges of her spirit, making it thin and frail like overbleached cloth. 

She probably had no idea.  The void that was the core of the Devil numbed his victims, leaving them unaware that they were being eaten away at until there was nothing left of them but hate and just enough self-awareness for suffering.  

After landing on the roof of the Chicago Athletic Club hotel and quickly calling down to the concierge to tell her that he was taking the Founders Suite and needed three bottles of water that had never run through metal, sea salt, preferably fleur d’sel, but anything would do, a pound of Symphytum officinale petals, some bandages, and a case of champagne, Laurent Perrier Cuvée Rosé and nothing else would do.  

The Athletic was an excellent hotel, and Madelia was an equally good concierge, so everything was was there for him within a half hour whilst he carefully undressed Nora, using a towel on her arm which had mostly scabbed over by then.  He was so pleased he sent Maddie his socks as a thank you. There was no doubt she was sitting happily at her desk, working diligently, with them stuffed into her panties.

As he made a paste of the water, salt, and comfrey, he drained two bottles of wine trying to keep his hands from trembling.  

Lucifer.  

He had not seen his brother angel in millenia by choice.  Just the sight of the Morningstar’s resplendent, flawless emptiness made his skin hurt, remembering the worst of his sickness, the moment of his transformation.  Even if he had somehow become resigned to himself, no longer just a creature of hell, which had obviously surprised Lucy as much as it had Loki, that memory would never be anything but pain.  

Unwrapping the towel, Loki cleaned the little, cursed wound Nora had given herself, wincing as she cried out but didn’t wake.  With a quick bite to his own wrist, he smeared his own blood around it, then coated it with the comfrey and wrapped it back in a clean bandage.  And waited, drinking and watching the snow and her breathing. 

Now she was back.  And feisty.

“Oh, is that how it’s going to be?  Giving me silly, undignified nicknames and making demands?”  Loki asked, trying to sound stern, but knowing he was failing. He had once convinced a field of dedicated Stylites to climb down and line up to be sodomized  with nothing more than a stern tone, a raised brow, and the slightest nostril flare. The little witch refused to be intimidated by him, and he found that he was unwilling to go to the depths he would need to reach to truly frighten her.  The idea horrified him. 

Which was hilarious, thinking on it.  

“Would you really believe it could ever be any other way?  With us, I mean?” she nuzzled his jaw, his neck, his ear, then brushed her lips over his.

“No, I wouldn’t,” he snarled, kissing her.

Not resisting.  Not able to. She was for him irresistible, impossible, and it seemed inevitable as well.  He had done nothing to deserve her and yet here she was. Nothing other than some stellar fucking, which he planned on continuing.  It was best to keep her distracted from her very righteous anger towards him, make sure she was too busy coming to send him packing.

Precious, ridiculous witch.  He was going to make her so sorry for worrying him.

Now, instead, he was kissing her.  

He would make her sorry later.  

Much later.

Now he was going to make her scream.

“Show me how wet you are,” he said, pulling away from the kiss, laying his mouth over her pulse and sucking lightly, his palm pushing her thighs apart so she was off balance, being held by him alone.  Her lovely cunt, with those pretty curls and that delicious clit, just glistened in the low light. With no further delicacy he thrust three of his fingers as deep in her as they could go.

She jumped, nearly falling, and then jumped again when his arm tightened around the bruises he had given her earlier.  She’d be wearing them for a while, as a reminder of her stupidity tonight, if he had anything to do with it. He fucked her hard with his hand, her cunt already clutching and pulsing around his touch.  “Mmmmm….. I feel you hugging me so tight here,” he rasped into her ear, then scraping the shell of it with a fang, making her shiver, all of the while circling her clit with his sopping thumb, so she whined and melted further, little more than puddle in his arms.  “You love it when I’m rough, don’t you? When I don’t give you a chance. When I have no mercy.”

Her breath juddering out in gasps as she tried to answer, tried to think, as her core grasped him tighter and tighter and faster and faster, pulling more of his touch into her, suddenly needing to come more than she needed to breath, as her body remembered how close it had come to death, her spirit to annihilation.  “I love, I -, I-, I- love you, I love everything you do. In bed. Everything you do in bed,” she babbled as he began to pull out his hand, alternately slapping between her legs and spearing into her cunt. “But elsewh-, in other-, oh fucking forget it…” 

She moaned and grabbed his hair, pulling his mouth back to her’s, snarling and sucking his tongue into her so she could suck on it and hump his hand and come with a scream that bowed her back, and he moaned, needing more of her on him, needing to cover her and be drowned.

Tossing her onto the bed before her moment had finished, he stopped only long enough to take a knee at the bedside and anoint his horns with the silky wet of her slit, rubbing them over and over, making her grab them and use them to rub herself to another orgasm, no sooner had the first ended.  Soaking him in glory, so it ran down his brow and cheeks and then to his sneering mouth where he licked his lips and went mad.

_ Swollen and sensitive and perfect and her cunt was what he had to have to be in and he was and he was and for what would only be the fourth time in his eons and eons of life he was going to come again and he was going to be in the arms of his love and he was going to stay and he was going to fuck her and fuck her and she was wild and writhing beneath him crying out and his wings unfurled far enough to catch even a breeze in a still room and she lunged up so he held her off of the bed that they now hovered above and he had to go faster and go deeper and be more in her and she had to come and then she had to come again and he had to keep from bursting into flame from going mad from the weeping from hurting her more than was safe from .. he had to keep from… he had to keep from… the pleasure that had haunted him and taunted him since he had fallen to the pit swept over him in surge after surge and this time rather than throwing it outwards and breaking windows and destroying masonry he kept it and when Nora’s one hand wrapped about one of horns and other stroked deep into his wing he bellowed an orgasm, meeting and tangling and concluding with hers _ .

 

Later, they slowly sank to the bed.  With what seemed to be the last of his strength, Loki’s folded away his wings and then rolled over, pulling Nora to him.

“You’re going to be here when I wake up, right?”  She said, weakly digging a knuckle into his side. “Just you.  No hyper-advanced case of split personality with his own wardrobe?  No developing other supernatural accoutrements, like … I don’t know, a forked-tongue, or a halo, or whatever?  Just you in this bed with me when I wake up?”

“In as much as I-” he started to smile at her, trying to be funny, but she wasn’t in the mood.

Nora put a finger to his lips, “Yes or no?  Because if there is any chance it’s no, just go now and forget coming back.  Or, um, coming back to my place. And if you leave me here you better pay the bill, and get me a change of clothing for that matt-”

He nipped her finger with a fang, and then kissed it, “Yes. From this moment forward it is yes, it will always be yes.”

A little jagged, Nora sniffled, and he held her, listening to the fire, until neither could keep their eyes open.

 

When she woke up, he was there.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The line 'city of your birth' is a shout out to Patti Smith, whose face and build in her youth is my reference point for Nora, and who always starts her concerts her, shouting, "Hello Chicago! City of my birth!"


	7. Good News for People Who Like Bad Weather

 

Loki stood naked before the long windows of their room, surveying the silent, white park as the sun rose, feeling his powers stretch out from him as they had not in more thousands of years than he could remember.  His angelic blessings and sanctifications, his halo effect as it were - even if the halo itself was still gone - had been restored to him. 

In a fashion.

Whereas Gelusael’s gifts had originally been meant for the aggrandizement of his creator, and to both protect and imbue a sense of  _ His _ presence to those who had chosen  _ Him _ as their specific deistic provider AND always followed all of the rules and conditions of said provider’s contract, Loki’s version seemed to be a touch different.

He could feel them.  All of them. Their lust and energy drawing towards him through the aether, feeding him more and more, causing his power to intensify, making all redouble their efforts, then triple them, and so on.

Everyone was going to sleep really well when this was over, and wake up nicely refreshed, he thought to himself with a beneficence he had not felt in…

He thought about it.

He had never felt any beneficence towards humanity.  That had always been the problem. He had despised them.  But no longer, he thought, smiling ruefully at his own change of heart.  Now he rather wanted nice things for the humans. Some of them at any rate.  And what could be nicer than a few snow days, plenty of play, and a lot of orgasms?

“I hate to stop looking at you, you make quite the picture, but I have to touch you,” Nora said in a voice that meant she was smiling at him.  She wrapped her arms about his waist. She pressed a kiss on his back between the blades of his wings, then lay her cheek against the same spot with a gentle sigh of contentment.  

Nora.

Nora was better than anything else all of the world, and heaven as well.  Hell, too, though that went without saying.

How ridiculous he had become.  Besotted and in love and thinking such puerile thoughts.  

He adored it.

 

The three days following Christmas in that year were notable in Chicago for a number of reasons.  

Most obviously was the blizzard that started late on Christmas Day night and went through the next morning.  When it tapered off, it left a clear sky where a brilliant sun shone down on the sugar gleam of a city buried under even more snow than the Snowpocolypse.  Though old timers snorted it still wasn’t up there with the ‘67 blizzard. That was the worst.

Less obvious at the time, but more significant in the long run, was no one died because of it.  There were no accidents, no heart-attacks while shoveling, no family fights turning ugly as was wont to happen during both the holidays and when people were stuck inside.  There was a strange, timeless quality to those three days where children - even the normally over-protected or those who lived in neighborhoods that were too dangerous to allow for much outside play - were sent forth to sled or make snowmen and forts and bombard each other with snowballs.  Snowballs that, no matter how hard and maliciously packed, would make a solid but unpainful impact and then poof into a cloud of white, leaving both the thrower and their victim prostate with hilarity.

For such was the quality of this strange, enchanted snow, where it would firm up admirably for Flexible Flyer or lunch tray run, but would cause no more harm than an uncomfortable but still fun chill when it found its way under a scarf and coat and down someone’s back.

Even those who might normally find it difficult to join these traditional shenanigans were somehow included.  Snow ramps were hastily constructed. The depths of the snow itself muffled distressing or too loud noises, as did earmuffs and headphones.  Handfuls of ammunition could be pressed into waiting mittens, the owners of which could then be turned in the right direction and told to throw, or to add to the pile, depending on if destruction or construction was occurring currently.

Even those who were normally solitary due to the stigmas and taboos of the world that children live in, were somehow swept into the games.  Those who were solitary by choice were still welcome to dip in and out of the games as they would, just to see what it was like, as if they were tiny anthropologists, unable to resist the lure of investigating a strange culture from within.

It was not that the children of Chicago had suddenly become little darlings, they were simply selfish - no, greedy - for more fun, for more play, and that meant finding ways for others who might have good throwing arms and even crazier ideas to come outside and join in.

Then, justly worn out from cold, snow, and the exhilarating joy of playing without being watched constantly, they would stumble to their homes as the sun set, turning the snow shades of pink and blue and violet as it went.  Once in, they would stamp off the snow, leaving heaps of coats and boots and sweaters, to eat huge quantities of food, and then to fight nodding off over their tablets, or books, or before the tv, or in some cases while playing a board game.  

To get up and do it again.

The adults were busy.  

Too busy to interfere with the great right, and rite, of childhood which was to play outdoors with others.  

They were fucking.  

That is to say some of them were fucking, some were making love, some were screwing, other boning, there was humping, copulating, fornicating, getting it on, chilling, sleeping together, scoring, mating, banging, laying, shagging, engaging in coitus, getting laid, getting nasty, getting dicked (with both organic and store bought penises), pounding, riding, and in general getting each other off with all of the accompanying kissing, stroking, licking, spanking, teasing, sucking, rubbing, tying up and tying down, tickling, massaging, pinching, slapping, nuzzling, whispering, groaning, moaning, screaming, crying, laughing, babbling, dirty talking, stripping, dressing up, playing acting, and even more extreme measures where they needed to be taken, all so it took to get everyone where they needed to go.

Couples that had long since thought they knew all of each others kinks were shocked and pleased by new revelations.

People took chances calling/texting/knocking on the doors of others they were attracted to thinking, “Maybe…” and somehow always seemed to have contacted just the friend/ex/acquaintance who had been about to call/text/knock on their door as well.

Group situations fell into new and exciting permutations.

Lovers loved.

Friends with benefits collected their dividends.

Booty calls got nasty.

Phone sex partners found their imaginations and vocal acting skills reaching new, undreamt of heights.

Those who preferred their pleasures solitary went to the doctor the next week with carpal tunnel flare-ups and peaceful smiles.

Those who were not interested in sex itself enjoyed the most satisfying cuddling of their or perhaps anyone’s lives.

Co-workers acted on long suppressed attractions.

Ex’s suddenly couldn’t remember why they had x’d in the first place.

Those who were not interested in even that found that they were able to visit any cafe or movie or museum or store or gym they wished with no crowds to annoy them, or indeed anyone to take their money.  Whilst out they would inevitably meet a like minded person who they would end up engaging in the most comfortable, longest conversation about everything and nothing over a coffee, a beer, or an oatmeal tropical fruit smoothie.

Those whose desires were fixated inappropriately, be it on children, animals, or anyone unwilling or outside of the possibility of consent, found themself confounded.  Unable to act, or even to access the will to cause harm. They spend three days in misery, trapped with themselves alone.

 

Maura and Thomas, trapped by the weather in Nora’s now sadly dilapidated house managed to find a spell creating a dome of air over the tragedy of the roof, and holed up with the remnants of Gelusael’s magnificent feast and the various objects in Thomas’s  _ special  _ travel case that they had not been able to utilize this visit.

“We.. we should have time to…” Maura tried to gasp out a complete sentence, as her head rocked from side to side, trying to find Thomas by the sound of his breathing though she was only supposed to use touch, her eyelashes fluttering against the supple leather of the strap that had been wound around and around her head, covering her eyes.

His deep, calm voice came from everywhere and nowhere around her.  

Cheating by using his magic. 

“Clean up?  I should think so.  If we don’t I refuse to feel any guilt this time, since I think this weather predicament is the fault of Chicago’s resident Fallen angel. Even my magic can’t budge it.  Now, no cheating,” he answered sternly. “Shall I help you with that, little girl?”

“Please, sir.”

“So polite,” he complimented as he brushed her hair back, making her jump, and put the headphones in place, and then quickly, roughly pinched her nipples and stepped away, signalling the restart of their play.

The cat sat in the window and watched the snow fall.  Every now and then she cleaned the tips of her paws.

 

The gigantic, marble tub was filled with steaming water, scented with sandalwood, almonds, and licorice, and Nora eyed it warily, even as she longed to sink into it, letting the heat of the water soothe her sore muscles and remove the dried sweat and spunk and the faint remaining stink of brimstone from Lucifer.

But she knew it was going to sting parts of her as bad a hellfire, so she hesitated.

“What are you waiting for?  While I can ensure the water will stay hot, I would think you would be eager for a proper bath after years of martyrdom to the terrible water pressure in your house,” Loki took her hand, leading her forward.  “Shall I assist you?”

“No, I can get in.”  Then she wondered if she could.  The sides were really high and she was sore.  “I’m just…”

“Just?”  

“Raw.  I’m just raw and that’s going to hurt like a son of a bitch.”

He burst out laughing.  “You are quite welcome.”

“Stop being such a dick.  Yes, that’s just made it funnier, hasn’t it?  But seriously, just because you’ve never experienced-”  

“Shhh… let me,” he wrapped himself about her from behind, soft kissing running up and down her neck, as he carefully cupped between her legs, one finger parting her like the pages of a book.  

Nora hissed in discomfort, involuntarily trying to shut him out, and he made a sad sound.  “No, sweet witch, let me, let me,” he then tenderly stroked, crooning in Enochian as he did, kissing her neck, her ear, her temple.  

At first his touch was cold, which felt wonderful, but slowly grew hotter, the sharpness of pain turning first slightly numb and then was soothed with warmth, then heat, and an ache that moved from his touch to deep within her, an ache that needed still more soothing, more caressing, more attending.  “Loki…”

“I have you, Nora.”

He did.  He did have her.  That finger found its way into her, making the ache worse.  She needed to be stretched, to be filled.

There was a long chaise lounge in the bathroom that had been brought in at ‘Master Loki’s’ special request and Nora turned, pushing his shoulders, “Lay down, Feathers,” she ordered more than asked.

He raised a perfect eyebrow, smirking, “Whatever you desire, treasure,” letting her shove him to where she wanted him, his wings folding away to nothing, sprawling with loose limbs and wild hair across the red velvet, creating a perfect contrast of crimson, ivory, and the blackest black.  Nora’s mouth actually watered at the sight of him, and she arranged his willing body so one leg was over the back of the chaise and one foot was on the ground, letting her kneel between his thighs, arms raised over his head so his neck was arched, so his presented for whatever she wanted.

For a few moments she just looked, taking in the length of his legs, lanky muscles and lean hips and broad shoulders, the size of his cock - which was still a bit of a shock even now -, the angle of his high cheekbones, the glint of fire and forest in his eyes, hooded and hungry.

“No touching,” Nora warned him with a shake her her finger.  

He nodded, not looking at her but staring at the ceiling with a look of grim tension about his mouth.  

Stroking her hands up his thighs, she wrapped one about his penis to lift away from his belly, mouthing and suckling on the head, her nose rubbing against the fine line of dark hair below his navel.  Her other hand played beneath his balls, lovely and full, stroking his asshole firmly, then teasingly as she took more and more of his cock into her hungry mouth. He was delicious and she was suddenly starving.  

His body writhed beneath her, clawing at the air, clearly fighting a need to grab her hair, to direct. 

Rewarding his efforts, Nora hummed about him, rumbling heavily and now massaging him beneath with two firm fingertips.  The noises he made caused her cunt to clench in time with them.

Pulling back with a resounding pop, Nora licked up and down the length of him, speaking between strokes as his hips started to work up and down in time with her, “Shall I finish you?  Let you spurt in my mouth, so it rolls down my chin and covers me, or shall I ride you until we both fall apart?”

As lost and mindless as any of his lovers had ever been, Loki didn’t answer.

She bit him.  

Lovingly.

He shot up, snarling, “Climb on my cock.  Now.”

So wet they could both hear her lower herself onto him, knees deep in velvet, thighs wide and sore, cunt so swollen that even after a night and day of sex he still stretched her and left her feeling nearly too full, nearly uncomfortable, Nora put her hands on the sleek muscles of his chest and rode.  

Each long, lifting stroke and drop, her hips rocking forward at the end so she could rub on him, made him more feral, made her forget anything but her body and his.  Taking her by the hip hard enough to bruise, Loki changed her pace, now rocking fast while he pumped his hips up and down beneath her. 

For an endless time they moved together, to the same purpose, each move ratcheting them higher, hotter, nearly molten.

When she reached to touch herself, needing more, needing to finish, feeling it remaining just out of reach, he batted her hand away with a sound more animal than angel, rubbing her clit with his thumb.  

Wild, she let him go, just slamming up and down with all of the strength left in her thighs, feeling him grow impossibly harder as he stared at her breasts, his lip raised and teeth bared, feeling him start to crest.  The rhythmless jerks of the beginning of his orgasm forced his touch harder against her and making her cunt pull him. With a cry, the pleasure overtook her and he surged into her.

Coming back to herself, Nora lay nestled on Loki’s chest, his arms loose about her as even his extraordinary skills and strength were briefly overwhelmed.  

They listened to each other breathe for a time, going from harsh and worn to deep and satisfied.

“Bath?” he asked.

“Bath,” she answered.

Settling into the wonderfully hot water, her back to his front, his legs bracketing hers, she sighed, “I wonder if there is any way I could fit a tub this big in my house.  Probably not.”

She felt him tense.  

“Treasure, I love you very, very much.  You know that, do you not?”

“I think that the last day or so has proved that, yes.”

“And you, of course, love me deeply as well.”

Nora snorted, “Oh, of course.”

“Good.  It is good we have established our great, and mutual, and utterly unshakeable love.  And with that established, there is something I need to tell you about your house…”

 

She didn’t scream quite as loudly when he told her about her roof as she did when she came, but it was pretty damned close.

  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for joining me on this journey, which ended up being longer and less purely smutty and funny than I planned. Because that's how these stories go. I have no say over them.
> 
> Now if I can just get Caffiend to write this Thomas/Maura's wedding...

**Author's Note:**

> Aqua regia is a shout out to the Sandman Slim novels by Richard Kadrey, staring my favorite not-an-angel James Stark. They are my ultimate comfort reading. If they ever made a series of them I want Tom to play Lucifer.


End file.
